The first time I got a glimpse on the changed cards (this summer*) I was quite happy about the changes. Most of the changes to upgrades were needed adjustments to cards that were too good (OE for 4 FP) and mechanics that felt wrong (double ram). Even Admonition nerf is okay for me, because Evade got a buff. I think you have to see those two together. This MC30c is still a pain in the @ss to play against. Most of the changes to commander cards are fine. Only Tagge 's problem isn't solved at all.

After a second thought I was a little bit confused about which cards didn't change at all. What I really don't get is the change for "Mon Karren". That wasn't a card I saw too often in play and wouldn't have thought of as a balancing problem. Why devs touched that title upgrade but not a dozen other cards (like the clearly overpriced VSD-titles) at all, was a mystery for me.

Now I think with the exception of commander cards, the Armada 1.5 cards changes were really only there to nerf the cards that were too good. How could the two new factions possibly have a chance to come up against the crazy combos that defined the meta for years. Maybe it was even a wise decision to wait with any buffs, until we know what the new factions and rules changes will do to the games. This is the biggest change to the game since the release in 2015. Armada was always developping slow and thoroughly. This is a huge step ahead: Evade, Intel, Pass Tokens, command tokens refreshing upgrades, new factions and 4 new ships for two new factions. (And we don't get new ships too often.)

Maybe we should just take a breath, look at what we got and not so much complain about what didn't come yet. This glass is half full. Even three quarters. I could imagine that wasn't the last time we saw changes to upgrade cards. Next time we maybe see some love for the red haired stepchilds of the upgrades.

And to all play testers: It's not that we don't like you. We're just jealous.

* A leak. I didn't get anything from FFG ever. Not one time in four years of wiki-labor. Even no answers to my emails. That's okay, only that you don't imagine me as dev-influencer.

Honestly is there any reason now to take a gladiator? I’ve never seen one without the demolisher title on it. They could have at least made the other title useable or come up with a new title to balance it out. I don’t think the glad will see much time spent on tables anymore. I hope I am wrong.

2 minutes ago, ninclouse2000 said:

Honestly is there any reason now to take a gladiator? I’ve never seen one without the demolisher title on it. They could have at least made the other title useable or come up with a new title to balance it out. I don’t think the glad will see much time spent on tables anymore. I hope I am wrong.

The Glad is just fine without titles. The problem was never that it sucked without titles, but rather that Demolisher was just too good to not take. I have seen @Triangular play multiple title-less Glads many times. (And sometimes even successful! 😜 )

8 minutes ago, ninclouse2000 said:

Honestly is there any reason now to take a gladiator? I’ve never seen one without the demolisher title on it. They could have at least made the other title useable or come up with a new title to balance it out. I don’t think the glad will see much time spent on tables anymore. I hope I am wrong.

I still use Demo, it just requires you to either flee or stay close to the target you want to shoot again.

That being said, I've seen more people planning on using them as projection expert platforms and such of late. /shrug

8 minutes ago, ninclouse2000 said:

Honestly is there any reason now to take a gladiator? I’ve never seen one without the demolisher title on it. They could have at least made the other title useable or come up with a new title to balance it out. I don’t think the glad will see much time spent on tables anymore. I hope I am wrong.

Yes, plenty of reasons. Still a great card on a super-fun small base ship that wreaks havoc. Its evade is more useful than it was which means enemy ships now need to lock down evade at medium and close range as well as brace and redirect. Four black dice can still ruin someone's day with or without APT.

1 minute ago, Formynder4 said:

That being said, I've seen more people planning on using them as projection expert platforms and such of late. /shrug

Isnt the Command Arquitens a much better option for that though, especially since it also has the option for redundant shields?

I guess I should wait until I try it and judge it then rather than jumping to wild conclusions.

1 hour ago, >kkj said:

Isnt the Command Arquitens a much better option for that though, especially since it also has the option for redundant shields?

But you can't take 7th Fleet Star Destroyer on an Arq, though. My double Kuat and Gladiator 7th fleet list loves the flagship Glad pushing shields to the ISDs.

1 hour ago, >kkj said:

Isnt the Command Arquitens a much better option for that though, especially since it also has the option for redundant shields?

Nope. Gladiator has a better synergy with the mission: doesn't die/lose shields as fast due to brace being available, normally stays close to the target and provides flak/some red dice pressure. Large suite of black dice creates no-go zxone for the opponent. The main reason to consider Arquitens would be to employ HoJ title (and Redundant shields makes the ship just too expensive for the role IMO)

I played SFO/PE/ER GSD2 in several of my fleets over the years and it is a solid investment for 73 points.

44 minutes ago, PT106 said:

Redundant shields makes the ship just too expensive for the role IMO

There is actually a nice combo that @Triangular recently came up with, that makes it possible for the Arquitens to profit from Rendudant Shields for 5 rounds (6th doesnt really count since there is no round after it that could benefit from the regained shields). It goes something like this:

Command Arquitens (59) with:

-Auxilliary Shields Team (3)

-Expert Shield Tech (5)

-Redudant Shields (8)

-Turbolaser Reroute Circuits (7)

Total: 82 points

Commander: Tarkin (28)

Include any number of Arquitens in your fleet. (If you use 4 of them and Tarkin, you have exactly 44 points left for 4 TIE Interceptors)

The trick is to use give out Repair Tokens in round 1 and use them to move your 2 rear shields to the sides. At the beginning of round 3 you will have your 2 rear shields back from redundant shields during rounds 1 and 2, thus making you profit for max 5 rounds from it, if you stay alive. The advantage to this is - as Triangular rightfully pointed out to me - that you can still use a Nav Command with the Arquitens during Round 1 to not totally indicate to your opponent where they will fly, because of their straight-forward nav chart. Together with the newly points-reduced Tarkin this seems like a really intriguing build to me that i would like to try out.

(And yeah those Arquitens are expensive as **** then, but this is obviously a tank build meant to score a few deciding hits and deny your opponent easy kills. 4 Arquitens might not be ideal though, maybe 2 or 3 and a different, more hard-hitting ship or a carrrier instead. Though Tarkin really wants all ships to need the same tokens.)

9 hours ago, RapidReload said:

My comment referred to my belief that the decision making process on what changes will be given to play testers was not made by the developers alone but influenced by a small number of people that the game designers had personal contact with and listened too. I come to this belief based on a few interactions with play testers, by the behavior of some people on this forum, by the way in which game designers chose to communicate and/or leak information to the actual community and by the actual changes. I am not saying that the fact that the designers (maybe) did this is necessarily bad, especially if they are not as familiar with the game than some members of the community, I am saying ... this (except):

except I do not belief that this is a large group of people as I am NOT referring to the play testers. They "only" test what is given to them and give back feedback which is often mostly ignored as I understand it. Is it rude to say that I belief that the result of the work of these "influencers" (for a lack of a better term) is mostly unsatisfactory and they therefore should not do it anymore? I guess you should ask your boss what she/he thinks. I doubt (hope not) that there is any money involved anyway, so these influencers would just loose some of their ... pride maybe, don't know what exactly they would loose?

You can dislike what the "influencers" as you call them did, but they're likely developers for the game too? Like, anything that gets tested comes from someone somewhere?

9 hours ago, RapidReload said:

I have no issue with play testers. As I understand it their interactions with FFG can be aggravating to them and most of them have little impact on what changes are actually tested by them.

So the testers have no impact on anything? Uhhhh ok. That's a take alright.

53 minutes ago, >kkj said:

[Tarquitens]

I've considered running something like that, especially with Tarkin's points reduction. Consolidate 2 into a Sovereign Cymoon ISD and a Munitions Resupply Gozanti.

1 hour ago, >kkj said:

2 hours ago, PT106 said:

Redundant shields makes the ship just too expensive for the role IMO

...

And yeah those Arquitens are expensive as **** then, but this is obviously a tank build meant to score a few deciding hits and deny your opponent easy kills.

Erm, thats a totally different role from the one being discussed (Projection Experts support ship).

13 minutes ago, PT106 said:

Erm, thats a totally different role from the one being discussed (Projection Experts support ship).

Yes but if you noticed i was specifically reacting to your statement that Redudant Shields is too expensive (which i agree with). Yeah i know you were talking about it in the context of a support role, but that card is still too expensive anyway so i figured i share that build with you because it semi-adresses the problem of the card being mostly worthless.

7 hours ago, flatpackhamster said:

I'm not sure how much Avenger needed 'fixing', apart from its point cost. Put it up to 12pts, make it a discard if you have to. It's a great card IF you can make it work. The timing, the target, the tokens, all has to be right and it takes some skill to make it work. Considering there's now also Krysta Agate and the Starhawk, so Avenger no longer wipes out all the enemy ship's tokens, but 4 of a possible 5 or 6 - and doesn't Agate bypass Avenger's effect anyway?

I agree, Avenger should've been changed with a points increase to 10-12 points rather than blowing a gaping hole in its ability. The primary purpose of Avenger is to reliably shutdown a defending ship's most effective defense token, and the change completely ruins that.

At least with new Yavaris, the additional attack die is virtually the same as single-die Bombers (Y-Wing and X-Wing) activating and attacking a ship twice. It's only a nerf for two-dice bombers (B-Wing and Scuurg), and they needed to be nerfed for game balance. TBH though I would've preferred if FFG had left Yavaris' ability the same and increased its cost to 10-12 points, just like Avenger.

I don't understand how FFG screwed up the points cost for the best ship titles for the Neb-B and ISD, pricing them both at 5 points, whereas inferior ship titles, like Redemption and Devastator, were priced 8 and 10 points, respectively. Flipping those points costs not only would've balanced Yavaris and Avenger, but would've made Redemption and Devastator more playable, so there would've been greater variety. How did that not occur to FFG in 5+ years?

43 minutes ago, Flyinpenguin117 said:

I've considered running something like that, especially with Tarkin's points reduction. Consolidate 2 into a Sovereign Cymoon ISD and a Munitions Resupply Gozanti.

I tried something very similar that didn‘t word too well. I would recommend a Kuat SD and Repair Crews instead of another token source, you really don‘t need. Or get rid of the Sovereign ISD and Gozante to take 3 Arquitens together with two Raider. That‘s what I wanted to try next. 😃 (Don‘t listen, @>kkj ! These are not the ideas you‘re looking for ...)

7 hours ago, flatpackhamster said:

I'm not sure how much Avenger needed 'fixing', apart from its point cost. Put it up to 12pts, make it a discard if you have to. It's a great card IF you can make it work. The timing, the target, the tokens, all has to be right and it takes some skill to make it work. Considering there's now also Krysta Agate and the Starhawk, so Avenger no longer wipes out all the enemy ship's tokens, but 4 of a possible 5 or 6 - and doesn't Agate bypass Avenger's effect anyway?

I believe they were trying to address individual activations (or back to back) that are too strong. Avenger as it was allowed for single activation that can one-shot any ship except the hawk and SSD. This isn’t fun in any way to face. I believe you could actually one shot a hawk as well (without agate) but it would require a nearly perfect roll

Yavaris allowing double taps puts a single Yavaris activation at a possible 20 damage from squads (without Norra) plus the ship itself shooting. Now it’s down to 16, but that 16 is harder to achieve than the 20 was.

Demolisher’s triple tap allowed for over 20 damage in a sequence that you can’t prevent if the Demolisher player has first and the target ship activated before Demo.

Upping points costs doesn’t remove the NPE of facing it and really just means that fleets will adjust to the points and still use it. A mechanical change is better. Making Avenger a discard doesn’t address how it was most strongly used as a massive first strike weapon.

Whether or not you believe the need was necessary, I think I’m roughly describing the logic they used to reach the decision.

8 minutes ago, Church14 said:

I believe they were trying to address individual activations (or back to back) that are too strong.

^This. Gamemechanics that give the opposing player no chance to react at all are never a good design choice. NEVER.

5 hours ago, >kkj said:

With that kind of logic you can never criticize anything. You think your doctor should NOT have broken all your teeth instead of fixing them? Dont go to the doctor then. Its a stupid arguement. I can still love this game and agree with the statement that the SSD, Starhawk and Onnager were all pretty boring and overpriced releases that didn't really impact the gamemeta all that much.

Its not about individual items.

The criticism was that the entire process if flawed and is resulting in the game being ruined.

If you truly believe that then leave.

If you dont like a specific then that is different.

A lot of people have put a lot of time and effort in for free to record and track data about the game, to feed that to the developers, to strategise on the solutions, to test the solitions and implement them.

The criticism is that the entire process above is degrading the game. There is no tweak or adjustment, what you want is a different game.

If a dentist breaks your teeth, then dont torture yourself by going to see them again.

5 minutes ago, Ginkapo said:

Its not about individual items.

The criticism was that the entire process if flawed and is resulting in the game being ruined.

If you truly believe that then leave.

If you dont like a specific then that is different.

A lot of people have put a lot of time and effort in for free to record and track data about the game, to feed that to the developers, to strategise on the solutions, to test the solitions and implement them.

The criticism is that the entire process above is degrading the game. There is no tweak or adjustment, what you want is a different game.

If a dentist breaks your teeth, then dont torture yourself by going to see them again.

I dont think you understood my metaphor, but i agree with the rest of your post anyway. I was specifically reacting to the criticism that the game (at least regarding expansions quality) went down from the SSD onwards, which i agree with. There was no reason for the Onager to cost 50 % more than the ISD despite having the same amount of plastic and even costing fewer points than the ISD. And the SSD was really just a overpriced plastic model with almost no inpact on gameplay, since there was just a total of 8 new cards in it. Yeah i get why they did that and that was the smart thing to do but for 200 bucks i just didnt see the value in it aside from a nice toy for the bookshelf. (Oh and my point with the dentist was, if a dentists ruins my teeth then i sure have the right to criticize that)

1 hour ago, >kkj said:

Yes but if you noticed i was specifically reacting to your statement that Redudant Shields is too expensive (which i agree with). Yeah i know you were talking about it in the context of a support role, but that card is still too expensive anyway so i figured i share that build with you because it semi-adresses the problem of the card being mostly worthless.

No worries, just to be pedantic - I specifically limited my statement on Redundant Shields to Projection Experts ships (where the cost of the ship matters a lot)

51 minutes ago, Captain Corvid said:

The primary purpose of Avenger is to reliably shutdown a defending ship's most effective defense token

That's correct for BTvenger or Sloane Avenger, not for Avenger in general (as originally Avenger's token shutdown was a result of defending player decision to use that token in the first place). And incidentally BT and Sloane were the two cards that were introduced way after Avenger was and were the primary reason for the nerf.

5 hours ago, >kkj said:

The Glad is just fine without titles. The problem was never that it sucked without titles, but rather that Demolisher was just too good to not take. I have seen @Triangular play multiple title-less Glads many times. (And sometimes even successful! 😜 )

Something to consider is that so far FFG has only released 'upgrade' card updates to the pre-1.5 ships.

The ship cards, themselves, are not appearing in the new format - so there is plenty of room for other tweaks, if warranted.

(I'd dearly love a turbolaser slot replacing the ordnance slot on the GSD2, for example...)

9 hours ago, Ginkapo said:

If a dentist breaks your teeth, then dont torture yourself by going to see them again.

Why do I suddenly feel attacked? 😜

11 hours ago, Ginkapo said:

If a dentist breaks your teeth, then dont torture yourself by going to see them again.

Okay, so I’m gonna expand on this dentist analogy that got put in here, because in my mind, it fits.

Most of the time my patients don’t need anything other than a cleaning. Sometimes, there’s a small problem that just needs a minor correction, a little polishing (XI7’s)

Often times I’ll see a problem in someone’s mouth that doesn’t seem like a big deal until I dig deeper (literally) and find it has some major issues, and I need to work on it until it’s just a shell of what it was. (Yavaris, Demo).

Sometimes a tooth is so messed up you just have to take it out. (SA, Pryce, Bail).

The times dentists get in the most trouble, though, is when they try to fix something that’s not great, but isn’t hurting anything either. Replacing an old, outdated filling that still works just fine, but looks ugly has lead to more issues than I care to think about. That’s when “I went to the dentist to fix my teeth, but (s)he broke them instead” happens. It’s usually better to just leave it alone, because you don’t know how much you “fixing” it will mess other stuff up. (Devastator, Independence)

No matter how gentle I am, my patients almost always feel some discomfort during and after a procedure. But it’s necessary to promote healing. (1.5 will likely be better for the game as a whole)

14 hours ago, geek19 said:

So the testers have no impact on anything? Uhhhh ok. That's a take alright.

That's not what he actually said, though. What he said was that most of the playtesters have a limited impact, in that they're only told to test X specific changes, without having a lot of input other than that. I don't know if that is an accurate statement or not, but that's what he said, not "the testers have no impact on anything."