Just now, Lochlan said:

If you have surge tokens left at the end of the round even after spending one at every opportunity, that is exactly as useful as a natural surge.

except that you have the surges left because you rolled 5 surges on the unit that only has access to 2 surge tokens, you spent them and then that half of the army has none let and so gets shot while the half with the surges are ignored, meaning that those surges were essentially useless.

Native surge to anything is better than a surge token becasue it works on all surges rolled not just 1 of them at a time.

If surge tokens converted all surges in that pool then i would agree with you but it doesnt and so i dont.

On 9/17/2020 at 10:29 AM, Lemmiwinks86 said:

Just like how Empire has many ways to assign extra suppression, Rebels is currently the faction that has more ways to remove them, so it's something.

Leia, Rebel Officer (commader and upgrade) and Pao have Inspire. You can add Hope to Luke to also give him Inspire.

Then Sabine, Jyn and Luke have command cards that give them Inspire for one turn (for Luke is not Inspire per se but is similar) and there's also Turning the Tide.

I don't know if I'm forgetting something.

you're missing the best card in the game to counter suppression. But the talking heads don't acknowledge it exists so I get it.

15 minutes ago, Tirion said:

you're missing the best card in the game to counter suppression. But the talking heads don't acknowledge it exists so I get it.

You mean Symbol of Rebellion, right? I totally forgot, I need to play more games with Sabine.

16 minutes ago, Lemmiwinks86 said:

You mean Symbol of Rebellion, right? I totally forgot, I need to play more games with Sabine.

Pretty sure he's referring to Complete the Mission as he is a...let's say zealous proponent of Jyn.

13 minutes ago, Lochlan said:

Pretty sure he's referring to Complete the Mission as he is a...let's say zealous proponent of Jyn.

Oh right, that's another great Rebel card for combating suppression!

Shame on me to forget as I'm another Jyn lover 😁

2 hours ago, Lochlan said:

Pretty sure he's referring to Complete the Mission as he is a...let's say zealous proponent of Jyn.

math is math my friend

3 minutes ago, Tirion said:

math is math my friend

6 hours ago, 5particus said:

Native surge to anything is better than a surge token becasue it works on all surges rolled not just 1 of them at a time.

Native surge has a cost though. Its not free. native surge usually means your attack or defense die gets downgraded.

Thats why stormtroopers are rolling white dice. because of native surge.

And its why shortroopers are rolling black dice. because no native surge.

a shoretrooper with a surge token produces a better result than a stormtrooper with native surge. because shoretroopers didnt suffer the dice downgrade for having native surge.

2 hours ago, Khobai said:

Native surge has a cost though. Its not free. native surge usually means your attack or defense die gets downgraded.

Thats why stormtroopers are rolling white dice. because of native surge.

And its why shortroopers are rolling black dice. because no native surge.

a shoretrooper with a surge token produces a better result than a stormtrooper with native surge. because shoretroopers didnt suffer the dice downgrade for having native surge.

Your argument to this nonsensical. Your comparing apples to oranges here. Let me give you the break down of dice:
A white w/ surge is better than a white die w/o surge.

A black die without surge is better than a white die w/ surge.

A black die w/ surge is better than a black die w/o surge.

A red die w/o surge is better than a black die w/ surge.

A red w/ surge is better than a red die w/o surge.

So yes shoretroopers with their black dice statistically do better than stormtroopers with their white dice and surge. And amazingly enough those statistics get even more skewed when you give the shoretroopers a surge token. However when you compare the stormtroopers white die w/surge to the b1s, white die w/o surge, the stormtroopers do better. The statistics get closer when you give the b1s a surge token, but the stormtroopers still edge them out.

So to make this clear, when talking about the same color dice, native surge is superior to a die without surge. When talking about different color dice, it’s irrelevant.

1 hour ago, Shadowhawk252 said:

Your argument to this nonsensical.

There is nothing nonsensical about it.

A unit like shoretroopers can use surge tokens on offense but a unit like stormtroopers cant.

That makes surge tokens better on units like shoretroopers than on units like stormtroopers.

So there is an inherent disadvantage to having native surge which is that you cant spend surge tokens as effectively.

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So to make this clear, when talking about the same color dice, native surge is superior to a die without surge. When talking about different color dice, it’s irrelevant.

its not irrelevant. because say you have to give a surge token to a unit. you have two choices: a stormtrooper unit or a shoretrooper unit. it is always better to give it to the shoretrooper unit because it DOESNT have native surge. Because the shoretroopers get two opportunities to use the surge token: once when they attack and again when they defend. Whereas the stormtroopers can only use it on defense so theyre far less likely to roll a surge and be able to spend the token.

the statement that native surge is always better than a surge token is factually untrue. when it comes to handing out surge tokens not having any native surge is preferable for the recipient of the surge token.

for example say youre running a palpatine list which uses aggressive tactics and force guidance. palpatine is handing out 4+ surge tokens a turn. it makes the most sense to include units in the list that DONT have native offensive surge. you want to use shoretroopers, scouttroopers, royal guards, etc... units with native offensive surge arnt as good in that kindve list because theyre less likely to be able to spend the surge tokens. Which is why a unit like deathtroopers wouldnt belong in that list.

another time native surge isnt really an advantage is if you have the critical X rule anyway. so for example the T-21 on the stormtroopers gives them critical 2. it largely makes their native surge pointless since youre highly unlikely to roll more than 2 surges with their attack pool. in that situation the stormtroopers would be better off not paying however many points for native surge. Which is why the T-21 costs too much because they didnt subtract out the cost of the native surge from the weapon cost of the T-21.

im sure theres more situations where having native surge is not always better.

52 minutes ago, Khobai said: .

for example say youre running a palpatine list which uses aggressive tactics and force guidance. palpatine is handing out 4+ surge tokens a turn. it makes the most sense to include units in the list that DONT have native offensive surge. you want to use shoretroopers, scouttroopers, royal guards, etc... units with native offensive surge arnt as good in that kindve list because theyre less likely to be able to spend the surge tokens. Which is why a unit like deathtroopers wouldnt belong in that list.

another time native surge isnt really an advantage is if you have the critical X rule anyway. so for example the T-21 on the stormtroopers gives them critical 2. it largely makes their native surge pointless since youre highly unlikely to roll more than 2 surges with their attack pool. in that situation the stormtroopers would be better off not paying however many points for native surge. Which is why the T-21 costs too much because they didnt subtract out the cost of the native surge from the weapon cost of the T-21.

So your primary argument is when you run YOUR palpatine list, that you spent 20 points on upgrades to give surge tokens out, for the faction that needs them the least overall, your limited in useful choices. How does this make a native surge worse than no surge again? You can build your lists however you want, it’s your personal preference, and I’m happy to see people coming up with new and unique lists, but just because you like a mechanic, doesn’t mean it is the best mechanics for your faction nor does it make it any better or worse than any other mechanic in this game. It is your opinion and choice to play that list. Now while your responses have been based on your opinions and feelings, mine have been based on statistics, probabilities and facts.
Now as for the stormtrooper unit with T-21, the only scenario that the crit 2 is better is the T-21 is still alive and the attack roll has 2 or less surges. If you have rolled more than 2 surges (unlikely with a 1/8 chance per die but still possible) or the T-21 has been killed (via force choke or los sniping, a common tactic used since day 1 of the game) then the storm troopers having a natural surge is better.

Ultimately every scenario you have come up with has been caused by the players choice in upgrades, and nothing to do with the units themselves, or opponents actions. No one made you issue that surge token to a unit that couldn’t maximize its potential, you chose to be in that situation by how you built your list.

10 hours ago, Shadowhawk252 said:

So your primary argument is when you run YOUR palpatine list

when someone makes a blanket statement that native surge is always better than surge tokens, you only need one example of when native surge isnt better than surge tokens to disprove that statement.

Yes palpatine surgespam is probably the most applicable example. but thats only because rebels and imperials are rather limited in their ability to generate surge tokens at the moment. As they get more and more ways to generate surge tokens there will be more advantage to taking units that dont surge natively in order to use those surge tokens more effectively.

And then of course the critical X keyword. When Stormtroopers take the T-21 with Critical 2 theyre mostly losing the benefit of their native offensive surge which theyre still paying points for. The cost of their native surge obviously wasnt subtracted from the cost of the T-21 or it would be a much cheaper heavy weapon.

Lastly, ISF are also an example of a unit that it makes no sense to have reliable 1 on. Because they offensively surge anyway and the odds of being able to spend that surge token on defense rolls are not so great. So thats another example of where native surge is actually a downside because its actually difficult for ISF to spend their free surge token that they pay points for. I personally think Shoretroopers should have reliable 1 and ISF should have target 1. That makes so much more sense since Shoretroopers dont surge natively and ISF need the free aim token for marksman.

So thats three examples. And Im sure theres more.

10 hours ago, Shadowhawk252 said:

Ultimately every scenario you have come up with has been caused by the players choice in upgrades, and nothing to do with the units themselves, or opponents actions. No one made you issue that surge token to a unit that couldn’t maximize its potential, you chose to be in that situation by how you built your list.

ISF. reliable 1 forces them to take a surge token they cant optimally use and may not even be able to use at all. That is not a choice caused by upgrades. It is caused by the unit being poorly designed.

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Now as for the stormtrooper unit with T-21, the only scenario that the crit 2 is better is the T-21 is still alive and the attack roll has 2 or less surges. If you have rolled more than 2 surges (unlikely with a 1/8 chance per die but still possible) or the T-21 has been killed (via force choke or los sniping, a common tactic used since day 1 of the game) then the storm troopers having a natural surge is better.

But the scenario of the T-21 being alive is a highly likely scenario since heavy weapons tend to die second to last most of the time. Force choke and LOS sniping are not nearly as common as youre making them out to be. The vast majority of the time the T-21 is going to live until the very end.

When you use the T-21's crit 2 youre not really benefiting from the native surge to hit of the stormtroopers so the points cost of native surge to hit thats baked into the base cost of the stormtroopers gets wasted. That's why the T-21 should be a cheaper heavy weapon because the cost of the native surge to hit should be subtracted out. Im not sure what native surge to hit is worth on the stormtroopers, probably at least 5 points, but those points should be subtracted out of the cost of the T-21.

Spamming surge tokens is a choice one makes to up the efficiency of units that are less efficient than units with native surge.

That is not a downside to native surge. It's a way of mitigating the downside of not having native surge.

It's like saying the downside of having a safe filled with gold bars is there's nowhere to put your loose change. Loose change isn't as valuable if you're already rich.

3 hours ago, Khobai said:

ISF. reliable 1 forces them to take a surge token they cant optimally use and may not even be able to use at all. That is not a choice caused by upgrades. It is caused by the unit being poorly designed.

I get what you're getting at, but let's look at Death Troopers: defensive surge definitely costs more than Reliable 1. And yet the DTs might never roll a surge at all on any of their defense dice (trust me, it happens). So the DTs are paying even more for an ability they are just as likely to not be able to use at all—and actually, because ISF has access to Del and Gideon to give the unit 6 wounds, ISF can be more likely to roll defensive surges as they will likely have more opportunities to do so.

5 hours ago, Khobai said:

when someone makes a blanket statement that native surge is always better than surge tokens, you only need one example of when native surge isnt better than surge tokens to disprove that statement.

There is no situation in which having a surge token is better than having a natural surge. None. At best it’s equal. And that’s if you only roll as many surges as you have surge tokens. Every other situation the natural surge is better.
For the imperial special forces, ignoring the fact that you have stated you think they are among the worse units to come out for empire, the whole purpose of the reliable 1 is to improve their defense. Makes their defense better than empire corps units but not as good as the death troopers. Also a 1/6 chance to roll a surge is better than a 1/8. You are more likely to roll a surge on defense per die, than while attacking.

For the t-21, the unit doesn’t looses the surge to hit. So why should the heavy weapon be cheaper? If you roll 3 surges on that units 8-9 white attack die you get 2 crits and a hit. Also I didn’t realize that you have seen the developers notes for the unit designs and have the comprehensive breakdown for what each ability costs. Oh you don’t? So that’s entirely based on guess work and assumptions? Man that makes a really solid argument for changing the price of that unit/ upgrade.

3 hours ago, Shadowhawk252 said:

There is no situation in which having a surge token is better than having a natural surge. None. At best it’s equal. And that’s if you only roll as many surges as you have surge tokens. Every other situation the natural surge is better.

Since weve already established that native surge costs more than surge tokens that means theres a cost differential. A cost differential alone is enough to disprove your statement because native surge costs more points than surge tokens, which is an advantage of surge tokens, theyre cheaper. But ive given at least 3 other examples as well.

A fourth example: clone trooper token sharing.

A clone unit with a surge token can share the token. A clone unit with natural surge cannot.

there are definitely inherent advantages to surge tokens over native surge. youre just in denial about it.

your statement that surge tokens are always worse than native surge is simply wrong.

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I get what you're getting at, but let's look at Death Troopers: defensive surge definitely costs more than Reliable 1. And yet the DTs might never roll a surge at all on any of their defense dice (trust me, it happens). So the DTs are paying even more for an ability they are just as likely to not be able to use at all—and actually, because ISF has access to Del and Gideon to give the unit 6 wounds, ISF can be more likely to roll defensive surges as they will likely have more opportunities to do so.

Youre absolutely right about Death Troopers. But DTs have nothing to do with the argument though.

My argument is that ISF could more effectively use their surge token if they didnt have native offensive surge.

Reliable 1 is a BAD ability on ISF specifically because they have native offesive surge which decreases the chance of them being able to use their surge token.

It is an example of when having native offensive surge actually hurts the ability for a unit to use a surge token. because they lose the opportunity to use the surge token on their attack roll.

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Spamming surge tokens is a choice one makes to up the efficiency of units that are less efficient than units with native surge.

That is not a downside to native surge. It's a way of mitigating the downside of not having native surge.

That is false though. Putting a surge token on a scout trooper unit doesnt make up for them being less efficient because theyre not less efficient than other units to begin with. 8 black dice of damage witih sharpshooter 1 for 60 points is probably the most efficient damage to cost ratio in the entire imperial army. Theyre already more efficient at damage per cost than other units and giving them a surge token increases that efficiency further.

That is what my palpatine list does. It takes units that are already highly efficient and lack offensive surge and uses surge tokens to make them even more efficient.

Now if FFG decided to release super scout troopers with 8 black dice, sharpshooter 1, and native surge they would be in every way better than the old scout troopers without native surge. But such a unit does not exist and is never likely to exist.

20 minutes ago, Khobai said:

That is false though. Putting a surge token on a scout trooper unit doesnt make up for them being less efficient because theyre not less efficient than other units to begin with.

There are not enough eye-rolls in the world...

I know you know what I mean.

Imagine a unit that is the same as scout troopers, but has native surge built in. Which one is more efficient?

There is not a sensible argument that you could possibly make that they have a disadvantage over scout troopers as they exist now.

Scout troopers' black dice with a surge token is factually less efficient than an equal number of black dice with native surge.

It is an inescapable fact of math.

7 minutes ago, Sekac said:

Imagine a unit that is the same as scout troopers, but has native surge built in. Which one is more efficient?

But if scout troopers had native surge they wouldnt be allowed to keep their two black dice. They would be downgraded to a black and a white or maybe even two white. For balance reasons.

Yes I agree if your entirely hypothetical super scout trooper unit with native surge and eight black dice existed and costed exactly the same as old scout troopers it would be superior.

But such a unit does not exist for obvious reasons. I base my arguments on the units that actually exist in the game. Not fictitious hypothetical units that will never exist.

2 minutes ago, Khobai said:

But if scout troopers had native surge they wouldnt be allowed to keep their two black dice. They would be downgraded to a black and a white or maybe even two white.

My argument is that a unit like scout troopers that has BOTH two black dice and native surge would NEVER EXIST.

That is both pure conjecture and entirely irrelevant.

We're talking about efficiency of dice. X number of whatever dice with surge is factually better than X number with a surge token. Sometimes the rolls break down that it makes no difference. On average there is a notable difference.

End of story.

its not conjecture. because scout troopers with native surge dont exist. that is a fact.

and units like stormtroopers that have native surge have white dice not black dice. while rebel troopers without native surge have black dice instead of black dice.

so its pretty obvious to me that having native surge means a downgrade in dice quality. stormtroopers would never get both a black die and native surge.

Just like scout troopers would absolutely NOT be allowed to keep their two black dice if they had native offensive surge. theyd be knocked down to a black and a white or two white. just like the stormtroopers.

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We're talking about efficiency of dice. X number of whatever dice with surge is factually better than X number with a surge token. Sometimes the rolls break down that it makes no difference. On average there is a notable difference.

But im not disputing that and never have. You seem confused.

Ive already said that scout troopers with native surge would be better than scout troopers without native surge if they both costed exactly the same number of points.

But scout troopers with native surge DO NOT EXIST. The only scout troopers we have are the ones without native offensive surge.

Again im basing my argument on units that actually exist not fictitious units that DONT exist.

So Ive given no less than 6 examples of when native surge is not always better than not having native surge.

1) cost: native surge costs more than surge tokens. cost differential is a disadvantage.

2) critical X weapons: The critical 2 on the T-21 on the stormtroopers largely renders their native surge obsolete yet theyre still paying for it in their cost.

3) palpatine surge lists: this list uses surge tokens to further boost the efficiency of already highly efficient units like scout troopers that dont have native surge.

4) ISF: reliable 1 is largely wasted on ISF because they have native offensive surge. They often end up wasting their surge token as a result.

5) clone trooper token sharing: clones can freely share surge tokens but cant freely share native surge (although they can do it with fire support at a cost).

6) surge tokens have flexibility and can be used to surge both offensively or defensively. while native surge only lets you surge on one or the other (unless the unit has double native surge).

20 minutes ago, Khobai said:

Again im basing my argument on units that actually exist not fictitious units that DONT exist.

And:

57 minutes ago, Khobai said:

A fourth example: clone trooper token sharing.

A clone unit with a surge token can share the token. A clone unit with natural surge cannot.

I guess I am confused. Because you are saying 2 very opposite things here.

4 minutes ago, Khobai said:

But if scout troopers had native surge they wouldnt be allowed to keep their two black dice. They would be downgraded to a black and a white or maybe even two white.

Yes I agree if your entirely hypothetical super scout trooper unit with native surge and eight black diceexisted and costed exactly the same as old scout troopers it would be superior.

I base my arguments on the units that actually exist in the game. Not fictitious hypothetical units that might exist but probably never will.

Man this has gotten ridiculous. I get it, you like surge tokens. Unfortunately empire isn’t designed for a surge token spam. In fact the only way to get the upgrades that give you surge tokens is to buy the upgrade pack or expansions that have nothing to do with empire.

So since your only talking about factual units that exists, where are these stormtroopers without a surge to hit that your using for a points comparison? Huh it’s almost like they are “fictitious hypothetical units that might exist but probably never will”?

Seriously if you want to use surge tokens that badly go play cis or gar. Or at the very least reassess your own tactics. Empire isn’t designed to maximize the use of that mechanic, they don’t synergize well with that mechanic, and honestly I will be very surprised if they ever get command cards that give surge tokens out.

But regardless though you are being to stubborn or obstinate to acknowledge this; an innate surge is better than the chance to use a surge token. And they only way you can argue against that is with “fictitious hypothetical units that might exist but probably never will“

4 minutes ago, Sekac said:

And:

I guess I am confused. Because you are saying 2 very opposite things here.

4 minutes ago, Sekac said:

And:

I guess I am confused. Because you are saying 2 very opposite things here.

im not saying opposite things

padme for example can freely share surge tokens. but padme cannot freely share her native surge.

padme is not a hypothetical unit she very much exists.

unless you want to dispute the existence of padme as your next great argument.

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I will be very surprised if they ever get command cards that give surge tokens out.

darth vader has a command card that gives him surge tokens

Padme is a clone?

Twist!

1 hour ago, Khobai said:

Reliable 1 is a BAD ability on ISF specifically because they have native offesive surge which decreases the chance of them being able to use their surge token.

It is an example of when having native offensive surge actually hurts the ability for a unit to use a surge token. because they lose the opportunity to use the surge token on their attack roll.

I mean...? It's not like not getting to spend the surge token is bad? Like, you don't lose points if you end the round with tokens that you got for free . If they didn't surge to hit, they would likely be cheaper, yes, but their offense would be significantly worse. And they only have Reliable 1—they wouldn't be able to spend it on offense and defense anyway, which their current setup absolutely allows them to do.

There is a clear breakdown of level of defense here:

X Die with no surge = Any Imperial Corps unit
X Die with Reliable (or some other source of surge tokens) = ISF
X Die with Surge: Block = DTs

Each level is more expensive than the last, but also more likely to block. The same thing works for attack dice. And a unit doesn't have to be 100%, pure, uncut efficiency to be good.

27 minutes ago, Khobai said:

and units like stormtroopers that have native surge have white dice not black dice. while rebel troopers without native surge have black dice instead of black dice.

Except that Rebel Veterans exist. They roll black dice and surge to hit.