40 minutes ago, LeMightyASP said:

People forget that the environment where Tracers existed before is completely different from where they exist now, so complaining before the card gets put on the table just seems silly.

I think it stands to reason that if something was decent in the incredibly broke atmosphere of 1st Edition and it has only been made better in Second Edition that plenty of this commentary seems warranted.

9 minutes ago, theBitterFig said:

I guess I'm a bit more sad than mad.

Like, this is just *anything*. Any offensive token to power the attack. Every friendly ship can grab a lock, regardless of range to the launcher. Any range.

Just a little bit of "like, really?" or a bit "I'm just too tired for this."

Now, Jango Fett? Jango I'm mad about, and I'm extra mad since it seems like literally no one else is mad about Jango.

Maybe give it till we get a spoiler article for it. More focus on Jango and what he’s coming with might cause it to flare on people’s radars.

If you don’t mind me asking, is there something in particular that has you mad about Jango, or is it more a sum of the whole?

1 hour ago, 5050Saint said:

I think it stands to reason that if something was decent in the incredibly broke atmosphere of 1st Edition and it has only been made better in Second Edition that plenty of this commentary seems warranted.

Well remember in 1e thread tracers were broken because of specific combos that no longer exist.

In 2e, ordinance is in a super strange spot and doesn't... work great right now. Thread tracer creates an interesting scenario, especially because most ships that can take it either have low maneuverability and can be dodged, or are fragile and likely can be I-killed.

As was pointed out, it creates a massive weakness in your list to depend on this for torps, and without torps if it is even a few points it becomes questionable except in super wide lists. Its interesting for sure, but it isn't 'removing' the weakness of locks so much as trading them: You now can lock during engagement, BUT this one ship has to live, focus fire, and hit.

It also is important to remember that in some scenarios this won't actually help TTK that much because you can't benefit from an entire list of 6 ESC or range 1 droids getting a lock on say... a Jedi with CLT. Your average shots to kill assuming the Thread tracer hits is 2.7, but without the lock you only need 3.6 hits average, meaning spending an attack on the lock makes you kill the Jedi SLOWER on average, and once its dead all those locks mean nothing. At range 2 and no ESC, its 6.8 shots to kill, as opposed to 5.6, so it is a bit faster, but that assumes the tracer hits and you didn't just take some other missile like a homing missile which is way better at forcing damage on the target instead of the thread tracer.

It is an interesting upgrade but it definitely seems its way less about swarm support and actually more about allowing a ship your taking for a supportive ability and not its attack to double down on that.

Quote

Ooh. That significantly decreases the hype about this. And there isnt a way to switch which target it is applied on either. You pick one and when your kill it, thats that.

This seems to actually be a really good design to help punish mega-tanky aces like Boba, who REALLY doesn't like having hunters peck away at him. You need to think way harder about bringing a low ship count list with these in the meta, because your risking proportionally way more of your points essentially being a guaranteed kill over the course of the game. It is even neat because larger lists can 'shield' the prey easier than a large one.

Obviously he isn't the main bad guy of the meta, but it makes it less realistic for points fortress Boba to be a good strategy, especially if these bad boys don't cost too much on a generic. They feel like a healthy 'meta hate' card in that its never terrible or too oppressive. Even vs a swarmy list there is often one ship you kinda wanna kill. And even vs lists this that this targets its not a total blowout, its just suddenly things are on the map that can hurt megatanks REALLY badly, especially if your clever and somehow alternate shots by these and other aspects of your list to gain the strain for 3 entire attacks.

1 hour ago, SabineKey said:

Maybe give it till we get a spoiler article for it. More focus on Jango and what he’s coming with might cause it to flare on people’s radars.

If you don’t mind me asking, is there something in particular that has you mad about Jango, or is it more a sum of the whole?

To start, he's an Initiative 6 Firespray (aka boosting 'turret'), with passive mods , and almost surely taking a Force crew . He's kind of the total package.

Add in the fact that folks who tend to be really mad about every part of that--I6, boosting turrets, passive mods, force--don't seem to care about Jango. That's just totally baffling to me.

Third, would be my own neurosis. When I fly against Ric, I find myself dialing in a lot of 3 speeds on everyone, to avoid his triggers, and having my dials controlled like that by an enemy ship is... irksome to me. It's just unfun. Jango operates in the same way. I've got to give up control of my actions or dial in ways that I'm sure will be very annoying to play against--at least very annoying for me to play against. I think Jango, whether or not he murders stuff on the board, will be a total buzzkill.

1 hour ago, 5050Saint said:

I think it stands to reason that if something was decent in the incredibly broke atmosphere of 1st Edition and it has only been made better in Second Edition that plenty of this commentary seems warranted.

I think it stands to reason that 2nd edition X-wing and 1st edition are two very different games, and just because a card in 2nd reads similarly to something that existed in 1st doesn't mean they work the same.

I also think it stands to reason that there is no obvious conclusion from this spoiler, so no need for outrage.

Instead of looking at what Tracers did in 1st, look at what Tracers will do in 2nd.

4 minutes ago, LeMightyASP said:

Instead of looking at what Tracers did in 1st, look at what Tracers will do in 2nd.

Sass aside, I agree with this sentiment.

1.0 tracers were nutso because of harpoons, which were an "8" point upgrade that was a 4 red (less valuable in 1.0 but still noteworthy) that pushed an extra bonus damage to you at least, and potentially more to your list. Imagine it like a proton torp that also did just 1 bonus damage minimum, or that equipped you with DMS, for 4 fewer points.

That doesn't really exist in 2.0, which means the 'upshot' of forcing locks is lower. It is still good, but not as bonkers. While it may feel like that is only slightly worse than a torp, the 'maximum payoff' of any given upgrade or card is actually important and can budge the needle a lot on what is broken vs meh.

3 minutes ago, theBitterFig said:

Third, would be my own neurosis. When I fly against Ric, I find myself dialing in a lot of 3 speeds on everyone, to avoid his triggers, and having my dials controlled like that by an enemy ship is... irksome to me. It's just unfun. Jango operates in the same way. I've got to give up control of my actions or dial in ways that I'm sure will be very annoying to play against--at least very annoying for me to play against. I think Jango, whether or not he murders stuff on the board, will be a total buzzkill.

But it's not you that RELIES on dial shenanigans, it's Ric. So it whould be you putting pressure on him, so...

gitgud?

I think these types of abilities are great to identify some variance in the game, since some lists (like quad phantoms, kinda) have some very repetitive flying patterns for EVERY game. If you have to change up your play style depending on the matchup, i'd say that is a net win for the game

@theBitterFig

I find it funny that I am also irritated at Jango for literally every reason besides his initiative (I think every faction should have access to all initiatives and good pilots for em) and his ability.

Yes its a 'griefy' ability, but as I often say, 'grief abilities are good for games, actually,' I like that part of the power of this ability is that its very skill testing and your opponent needs to decide how much dial freedom is worth over the modification effects, very skill testing, very Blue Control without throwing the whole game out of whack because it is MUCH weaker defensively than Boba's.

If he was in scum, he would be a fantastic design in my eyes.

9 minutes ago, LeMightyASP said:

But it's not you that RELIES on dial shenanigans, it's Ric. So it whould be you putting pressure on him, so...

gitgud?

I think these types of abilities are great to identify some variance in the game, since some lists (like quad phantoms, kinda) have some very repetitive flying patterns for EVERY game. If you have to change up your play style depending on the matchup, i'd say that is a net win for the game

Naw.

There's fun ways and unfun ways for these things to happen.

I think Jango's going to be one of the unfun ones.

33 minutes ago, theBitterFig said:

To start, he's an Initiative 6 Firespray (aka boosting 'turret'), with passive mods , and almost surely taking a Force crew . He's kind of the total package.

Add in the fact that folks who tend to be really mad about every part of that--I6, boosting turrets, passive mods, force--don't seem to care about Jango. That's just totally baffling to me.

Third, would be my own neurosis. When I fly against Ric, I find myself dialing in a lot of 3 speeds on everyone, to avoid his triggers, and having my dials controlled like that by an enemy ship is... irksome to me. It's just unfun. Jango operates in the same way. I've got to give up control of my actions or dial in ways that I'm sure will be very annoying to play against--at least very annoying for me to play against. I think Jango, whether or not he murders stuff on the board, will be a total buzzkill.

Got it. While I find “firespray = turret” to be hyperbolic, the complete Jango package combined with some concerns about the CIS as a whole does have me worried about how he (and probably his fellow pilots) will impact the game upon release. We’ll see.

Man, too much to take in again.

I want 3. Um... and Jango....

(Mostly why I'm not mad at him, but more at the thought of everyone else also flying him, thus making it way more boring for me to do so)

(So I guess I'll try and fit 2 Generic Spray dudes again)

(with Tri ofc)

I was so massively interested and salivatory about a pair of I5 Tri . But I really don't like looking at people's dials. I am a bit disappoint that I'd need to, or waste 2 entire abilities. But the set up with boosters looks a bit fascinating.

Oh hi, suddenly in my face 3hp ship with no defensive tokens!

Fearsome Hunters are wickedly mean for aces and things. Maybe an interesting mini game.

These things will need 2 calc to not just explode instantly an awful lot. I don't know any numbers, but maybe networked calc will just run out of tokens too fast for 2×3/4 dice? Being close enough to share them is normally close enough to just pick which one to shoot.

2 calc is quite liberating.

I feel not worried about Tracers. Though I do feel a bit worried for large ships in the context of a lot of new things.

Tracers are gonna miss, a lot. Depending on them is a trap. Treat them as as bonus 3 die attack and you start to get something.... But they will easily be too expensive, even if not at release. If they come in at 4 and seem to be an issue... I'd be surprised to ever see them at 6 or even more.

At 6, I probably take Concussion anyway, because I'm probably already carrying ways to max out the mods and can't really afford to give up an attack. Plus I get a 3rd turn of relevant dice.

A small wing of TT Serrisu and a few torp Spacers alongside something that makes the TT stick and then brutes out the end game..... or brutes so hard it doesnt need to make it that far... Hmm....

A Bus maybe.....

A Bus carrying Bossk in a Z maybe, who can pop out into a double mod TT maybe, and maybe Latts then drops the lock for a tractor maybe....

I'll say about tracers: I'm not worried, per se. I just don't think they should exist.

10 hours ago, Hippie Moosen said:

Those Intercept Boosters seem really cool and thematic. Not sure if they'll be on most Tri-fighter lists, but definitely a neat card to toy around with.

They will certainly be handy in Epic, where there is a lot more ground to cover.

Also:

Structures?? Do we have structures, or should I get pretty excited about this????

4 hours ago, theBitterFig said:

To start, he's an Initiative 6 Firespray (aka boosting 'turret'), with passive mods , and almost surely taking a Force crew . He's kind of the total package.

Add in the fact that folks who tend to be really mad about every part of that--I6, boosting turrets, passive mods, force--don't seem to care about Jango. That's just totally baffling to me.

Third, would be my own neurosis. When I fly against Ric, I find myself dialing in a lot of 3 speeds on everyone, to avoid his triggers, and having my dials controlled like that by an enemy ship is... irksome to me. It's just unfun. Jango operates in the same way. I've got to give up control of my actions or dial in ways that I'm sure will be very annoying to play against--at least very annoying for me to play against. I think Jango, whether or not he murders stuff on the board, will be a total buzzkill.

Or you could just pretend he always has his ability, and be pleasantly surprised when he doesn't. Kind of like how you just always assume Boba has his ability (sometimes multiple times, even), though you can always play differently to try to avoid it.

12 minutes ago, Darth Meanie said:

Structures?? Do we have structures, or should I get pretty excited about this????

No structures. Yet.
Though they were teasingly added in the rules reference, alongside the negative recurring charges and standardized keyword this expansion has, so it's just a matter of time...

I hope Tracers are costed conservatively, glad they’re back but could prove to be an issue if too cheap.

As for the rest, I am excited by the chassis and look forward to playing around with those I5’s mixed in with some Vultures. Dial flipping when you have a pack of token sharing, dirt cheap blockers on hand is pretty cool. Seems solid enough to me and I’ve even had a lot of success in the past with early game SLAMin’ which these guys can bring for added funsies.

I'm really surprised these are 3 attack die. I woulda thought they'd be two.

(And the LAAT 3attack)

2 hours ago, FriendofYoda said:

I hope Tracers are costed conservatively, glad they’re back but could prove to be an issue if too cheap.

What do you consider conservative?

In the old system they were '2' points. I can't see them good at 5 even with synergy just because the math so disfavors them even on 2 dice ships, and they lose out to prockets in almost any situation once they hit 6. Turns out handing out double mods is really nice, but not as an attack replacement. Vs some ships, if you only average 2 ships with the lock with 3 reds, you literally lose damage on an ion missile.

I think the exact opposite. I want shockingly generous thread trackers, because their mechanics actually do interesting things to both listbuilding and actual gameplay. Judging by their pricing of other effects that have come out recently that sort of muck about with the rewards of attacking to encourage ship consistency, I wouldn't be surprised if they are very cheap. I would rather they get pushed up than start weak because they are actually a very dynamic upgrade unlikely to actually totally trash the game right now (even ignoring that Spamtex exists).

2 minutes ago, dezzmont said:

Turns out handing out double mods is really nice, but not as an attack replacement.

Yet Tractor Beam is (/was) often taken for this exact reason. It was even taken on Dooku for this, and he starts with 3 attack!

8 minutes ago, Matanui3 said:

Yet Tractor Beam is (/was) often taken for this exact reason. It was even taken on Dooku for this, and he starts with 3 attack!

-1 agility is a different beast, and comes with a reposition effect (Which makes tractor hard to balance because its really two effects to be rolled into one). Vs a hypothetically focused target, -1 agility is +.75 damage, while on a defender a double mod is .18, so you need to be firing off 4 dice attacks to break even on the tractor. Obviously the benefits of the tractor are lower if the target is unfocused, but that almost always will only happen because the tractor misses on a focus spend, and if the tractor does that the tracers are more likely to miss.

Don't get me wrong, double mods have other bonuses besides a damage increase (they allow you to apply damage far more consistently and double stack damage besides, making them a nice pair with ion effects). And this obviously enables munitions to land on first engagement with a lower initiative, but that is actually one of the most interesting things about it because its extremely risky to depend on this for your lists to get locks, and you have extreme diminishing returns firing multiple torps at one target, and if that were a problematic mechanic passive sensors wouldn't be a 2 point tax on most ships in the game.

But as a raw damage boost its worse than a tractor in most situations, and it lacks the extreme highs a tractor can do like double stressing a ship. Ultimately its... not actually a scary upgrade at all, and I suspect it will be priced at 3 as a sidegrade to tractors and ion missiles, which both fill similar niches.

13 hours ago, theBitterFig said:

To start, he's an Initiative 6 Firespray (aka boosting 'turret'), with passive mods , and almost surely taking a Force crew . He's kind of the total package.

Add in the fact that folks who tend to be really mad about every part of that--I6, boosting turrets, passive mods, force--don't seem to care about Jango. That's just totally baffling to me.

Third, would be my own neurosis. When I fly against Ric, I find myself dialing in a lot of 3 speeds on everyone, to avoid his triggers, and having my dials controlled like that by an enemy ship is... irksome to me. It's just unfun. Jango operates in the same way. I've got to give up control of my actions or dial in ways that I'm sure will be very annoying to play against--at least very annoying for me to play against. I think Jango, whether or not he murders stuff on the board, will be a total buzzkill.

Maybe people aren't that mad about Jango as he is more like Quickdraw. More an I6 bruiser then he is an arc dodging ace. CIS Firespray has no acces to Slave1 which make Boba way more npe then without it. Also without the rerolls that Boba brings the force crew is also slightly less good.

His aility is pretty limited as making sure you trigger it requires very limited dialing with Jango and your opponent to do a a more difficult maneauver, take a focus action plus roll a focus result. Nice when it happens and triggers, but doubt it will be worth it to chase to hard.

That you are triggered to limit your flying against abilities like Jango or Ric is (sorry to say) more your problem. I often fly against Ric and althoug I am happy everytime I deny Ric his extra dice, I will not go out of my way to get it. I will dial in the maneauver that will most likely get me the best position even if that means Ric will get his extra dice. Same idea when flying Defenders myself. Most opponents expect you to 4k and 3+ speed all the time when multiple times each game I will for example 1 bank with them.

Edit:

On topic for the Tri Fighter, I really like them. Will likely create some more varied driod lists which is a big plus in my eyes. For sure getting 2 to start out

This game is supposed to be about outguessing your opponent. Not looking at their dials. But maybe it is just me, but imho Informant, Sense and the new ini5 Phlajtxkych Prototype should not exist in the game. No range restriction as well. But at least the cost of establishing (not that difficult for CIS though) and spending a lock.

---

One variant of Thread Tracer painter (apart from Warthog!) is of course taking a high ini ship, like Serissu, N'dru, Airen. Much less likely to be ini-killed.

I would like to see Z95 again, right now they are pretty dead. Tracers and clusters 6-8 ships - lot of shots.

And like Deadeye Shot a card which should be not allowed when playing with Huge ships. I hope they start to restrict some cards in Epic like they do for Hyperspace. Cause otherwise, while Huge ships finally got good, it looks like FFG does everything they can to ruin them, as in 1st ed back then.

----

Speaking of Z95. I had in the earlier spoiler not realised that this is deploy as well. A neat thing is taking the YV666 with title, allowing you to dock a Z95. Take a full Z95, e.g. Bossk, with Marg. Esp on Moralo.

Deploy, give strain, attack! Ofc too costly for real cutthroat competition level, but neat.

11 hours ago, theBitterFig said:

To start, he's an Initiative 6 Firespray (aka boosting 'turret'), with passive mods , and almost surely taking a Force crew . He's kind of the total package.

Guys, I think we should delete rebel Han.

To start, he's an Initiative 6 Falcon (aka boosting 'turret'), with passive mode, and almost surely taking a Force crew. He's kinda the total package.

Everyone knows it's a terrible experience to fly against him, and no fun can be had when doing so.

1 hour ago, Managarmr said:

This game is supposed to be about outguessing your opponent. Not looking at their dials. But maybe it is just me, but imho Informant, Sense and the new ini5 Phlajtxkych Prototype should not exist in the game.

Me too. Though I don't mind people looking at my dial as much as I really don't enjoy looking at others.

1 hour ago, Managarmr said:

Deploy, give strain, attack! Ofc too costly for real cutthroat competition level, but neat.

Huh. 🤔

Well. Cost has never stopped me trying to compete with these things

edit. Yeah you really hooked me a bit with this. Now I'm a big Latts fan... It will take a somewhat ludicrous amount of set up, the bus kinda needs to go in with a lock to pass to Bossk... But deploy him, focus and throw strain, lob bus, spend lock to tractor... that is almost certainly gonna be a hit from Bossks Tracers... Kapow from Latts and friends inbound.

This touches on the TT problem a little. Anything predictable enough to reliably get stuck in that trap, likely requires little work to just crack open with plain old guns.

22 minutes ago, LeMightyASP said:

To start, he's an Initiative 6 Falcon (aka boosting 'turret'), with passive mode, and almost surely taking a Force crew. He's kinda the total package.

I think very big target, 1ag kinda detracts from the total package thing.

2 hours ago, LeMightyASP said:

Guys, I think we should delete rebel Han.

To start, he's an Initiative 6 Falcon (aka boosting 'turret'), with passive mode, and almost surely taking a Force crew. He's kinda the total package.

Everyone knows it's a terrible experience to fly against him, and no fun can be had when doing so.

Han's ability should absolutely be charge based. 1-2 charges. Boba as well.

As already named larger base. Han's boost is red(!) Only 1 green with 3 hitpoints more, mostly melts faster. And Han has to reroll all dice, cannot pick dice with bad result like Boba.

And there were problematic Han lists, but those squashed FFG rather fast and hard.