Discussion topic.

Has balance gone too far? I was making lists and I'm noting that nearly all my competitive sounding lists are just all generics or ace+swarm lists (with a few notable double ace exceptions, which will be very hard vs most of the double arc lists).

We're entering a phase of even more effective generic costs with these new points.

So you're saying I can't just win by showing everyone how S-M-R-T I am when I get to move after everyone else does?

I already cast my hat into the ring before the points changes ( https://stayontheleader.blogspot.com/2020/11/theres-too-many-of-them-why-generic.htm l) and frankly what has just happened with points only makes things worse. Thread Tracers are likely a massive problem.

I hope AMG do a better job than FFG ever did.

4 hours ago, Stay OT Leader said:

I already cast my hat into the ring before the points changes ( https://stayontheleader.blogspot.com/2020/11/theres-too-many-of-them-why-generic.htm l) and frankly what has just happened with points only makes things worse. Thread Tracers are likely a massive problem.

I hope AMG do a better job than FFG ever did.

Yeah I agree with a lot of what you said here.

though I would say the answer again becomes upgrades: more splash and more highly offensive, game-speeding-up upgrades are needed.
i3 and i4 needs to be in a perfect spot to prey on the i1-3 swarms.

I feel like the current prices of generics are great competitively but we need something to break up the math part of the game. Too many games becomes generic vs generic or generic efficiency slogs with tons of arcs pointing everywhere doing eventual chip damage. (This is where I’m hoping the good generic ships don’t get a 1 point increase.)

I think the increased difficulty for aces is about right (maybe a tiny tad too far).

one of the main problems is just the lack of firepower vs the hull and agility. Survivability needs to go down and offense upgrades and options need to go on the rise. Too many games are now ending on time with generic bulk significantly remaining on the field.

36 minutes ago, Blail Blerg said:

one of the main problems is just the lack of firepower vs the hull and agility. Survivability needs to go down and offense upgrades and options need to go on the rise. Too many games are now ending on time with generic bulk significantly remaining on the field.

I'm only seeing this occur frequently with traditional Ace lists. Most of the games I've played as of late and many of the games I've watched have ended with total destruction or massive damage on one/both sides. But I haven't played in any major competitive events since Coruscant, so things may have changed since then.

2 hours ago, Blail Blerg said:

Yeah I agree with a lot of what you said here.

though I would say the answer again becomes upgrades: more splash and more highly offensive, game-speeding-up upgrades are needed.
i3 and i4 needs to be in a perfect spot to prey on the i1-3 swarms.

I feel like the current prices of generics are great competitively but we need something to break up the math part of the game. Too many games becomes generic vs generic or generic efficiency slogs with tons of arcs pointing everywhere doing eventual chip damage. (This is where I’m hoping the good generic ships don’t get a 1 point increase.)

I think the increased difficulty for aces is about right (maybe a tiny tad too far).

one of the main problems is just the lack of firepower vs the hull and agility. Survivability needs to go down and offense upgrades and options need to go on the rise. Too many games are now ending on time with generic bulk significantly remaining on the field.

I will say, the upgrades have been one of my greatest disappointments with 2.0. I understand where a lot of the fear about exciting upgrades comes from, given what happened with 1.0. Make a few splashy upgrades that are 1 dot limited, and that can pair well with a few abilities

2 hours ago, hargleblarg said:

I'm only seeing this occur frequently with traditional Ace lists. Most of the games I've played as of late and many of the games I've watched have ended with total destruction or massive damage on one/both sides. But I haven't played in any major competitive events since Coruscant, so things may have changed since then.

I think it takes someone who really good in your sphere to play bulk or heavy hull lists to show you what it's like. I had someone really turn my world upside-down when they beat me. Until then I didn't understand. So, I hope you do find that experience.

It’s largely play style in my opinion. Throw any lists together in a round one joust and you’ll have win by elimination.

But that’s high dependency on dice and tournaments have taught us to be more selective. And the fly away and regroup before reengaging

They don’t need to add anything. High offense is just highly priced right now. Also they could mess with ship counts and generic count rules.

They could easily make the game named pilot heavy. I personally think there’s a purposeful move towards Ace and friends.

Not to be all conspiracy but high ship counts is good for business.

#RaiseSmallBaseCosts

I don’t even know what the complaints are about here.

You log in one day and everyone is kvetching about how the “Aces Are Too Good, Make Generics Playable,” and you turn around five minutes later and people are all up in arms about how “There Are Too Many Swarms.”

I think the costs of most generics seem to be about right. I think the recent +4 point increase on Saber Squadron Ace was too severe, and I think RZ-1 could still be cheaper. So, lower small base costs?

I’m just playing kitchen table X-Wing, but my local group hasn’t noticed any big reason why small bases ought to be any great deal more expensive than they are. If anything, it seems to me that a lot of the larger ships need a bit of a boost at the moment.

4 hours ago, Cpt ObVus said:

You log in one day and everyone is kvetching about how the “Aces Are Too Good, Make Generics Playable,” and you turn around five minutes later and people are all up in arms about how “There Are Too Many Swarms.”

Thats every game's forum ever.

People are vocal to complain, quite silent in enjoying their cup of tea.

18 hours ago, LUZ_TAK said:

Thats every game's forum ever.

People are vocal to complain, quite silent in enjoying their cup of tea.

Some folks are frustrated that the game isn't _exactly_ right per their individual expectations and tastes.

I have a different point of view. For me the game is one of dynamic equilibrium. I expect changes to adjust my play options and style. The exploration that comes from these changes is a huge source of my enjoyment.

In this regard X-wing 2.0 has been, is and likely will forever be in a better place than X-wing 1.0 was for most of its release waves. I had a lot of fun with 1.0 but find 2.0 to be even more engaging.

I for one am thoroughly enjoying the current extended meta. While I rarely play hyperspace, I find the current options to be fascinating to ponder. As a regular Epic player, the news that generics are good isn't really new.

We need a new upgrade- Re-Roll 2 dice if the defender is a generic. Call it Veteran or Ace?

Or call it Target Lock?

4 hours ago, Bravo Null said:

We need a new upgrade- Re-Roll 2 dice if the defender is a generic. Call it Veteran or Ace?

have I got the card for you

@Nyxen

Try deleting everything in the image link back to “.png”

But I imagine I know what the image is... 😜 🤣

yup.....

I think there's a limit to how much efficiency can be improved to buff bad ships and still get a dynamic game out of it.

I'm not sure whether things have gone too far, but I think things can't really go much further. T-70s, for example, can't be buffed any more without seriously crossing some breakpoints that probably shouldn't be crossed.

My preference would be for a great many things to get at least +1 points added. I don't want to see lackluster Academy Pilot TIE Fighters get cheaper, I'd rather most other stuff go up. X-Wings, TIE/fo, Scyks. A lot of stuff that, in some ways, doesn't really need nerfs... but I think it'd be better to shift the scale upwards, and not just down. Aces probably benefit if nearly everything goes up, but aces would also go up, and get fewer toys.

But maybe that's a misdiagnosis of some deeper issue... I wonder if there's just fundamental problems with how initiative works. Generics kind of need to have massive efficiency, or else they just get wiped off the board by aces. But when they have too much, the lists become kind of unkillable.

//

Time to go fully off the rails...

Right now, Low Init only blocks, and High Init has both Arc Dodging and Initiative-Killing. Change how IKills work, lessen the penalty for being 0HP before shooting (maybe a smaller penalty, maybe none). I keep thinking... what if the engagement phase didn't flip initiative order? What if every round was low-to-high?

I don't think it works with all the current initiatives (Han and Kylo, for example, ought to be changed to Low-Init, to shoot early). However, I think there's theoretically an interesting version of the game where there are both aces and generics at high and low and middle initiative, and it's not clean-cut whether you want high or low. An arc dodger like Soontir or Fenn Rau would have to wait through everything, trusting their position and green dice. A quick shooter like Han can put a lot of hurt out early, but most opponents can react to him. Would an Ordnance carrier like a Gunboat or a K-Wing rather be High Init for easy locks, and rely on their toughness to get their shot off, or would you rather have difficulty getting locks but shoot quick at Low Initiative?

My gut says that gives players a lot more choices, and there's a reason to take generic pilots at different parts of the init scale. And if you're not paying also for the initiative boost, only for the pilot ability, maybe mid-tier limited pilots become a lot more tempting, too.

1 hour ago, JBFancourt said:

@Nyxen

Try deleting everything in the image link back to “.png”

But I imagine I know what the image is... 😜 🤣

Huh, it looked fine on my side when I posted it. Interesting.

9 hours ago, theBitterFig said:

I keep thinking... what if the engagement phase didn't flip initiative order? What if every round was low-to-high?

Etc.

I do really like this idea. Probably needs going over everything with a fine tooth comb, but on the surface, I think it maybe solves more problems than it creates.

Two things that ping. Warthog is really good. If everyone is Warthog, maybe it's not really good?

Aces shooting last, with perfect target and mod info, instead of just joust and Init kill, makes a lot of sense.

Like you say, variability, rather than low-high for everyone , provides a great deal of nuance. Max bodies, or max Init kill is so binary.

I'm just fine with the new shape of things. I imagine over time the pendulum will swing back the other way and aces will be the norm, and we'll be right back to wondering why they even bothered to make generics. Metas change. Who knew?

On 12/3/2020 at 9:22 PM, Sithborg said:

I will say, the upgrades have been one of my greatest disappointments with 2.0. I understand where a lot of the fear about exciting upgrades comes from, given what happened with 1.0. Make a few splashy upgrades that are 1 dot limited, and that can pair well with a few abilities

cough scum "Illicits" needed something... they gave a nerf to Contraband Cybernetics so thats something.. . these still remain a big unexplored design space... a Block Hole you might say.

On 12/8/2020 at 12:26 AM, LUZ_TAK said:

Thats every game's forum ever.

People are vocal to complain, quite silent in enjoying their cup of tea.

"For every genuine complaint, there's a hundred people just itching to get their own way" - Customer Services Maxim

Let's face it, "what's good for the game" and there's "what I think should happen" meet very infrequently, and are casual acquaintances at best.

Hey look! It's our man @theBitterFig ! He's a cool dude who knows the score...

14 hours ago, theBitterFig said:

I keep thinking... what if the engagement phase didn't flip initiative order? What if every round was low-to-high?

Don't you dare Greedo my Han! Who do you think you are, George Lucas??! 😂

That would basically have to be done in a third edition anyway. I'm not horribly opposed to the idea, but would it still be the same core experience at that point? I was a big fan of the shrinking of the init/PS system because it kept that core experience intact. It's one of the many things that was a pipe dream of mine back in first Ed. I was pleased as punch it actually happened. As an example of times when 'good for the game' and 'what I want' met. Actually 2. Had a lot of that.

Here's another idea.

Aces––––––––Swarms

There are a lot of other things on the table, and those are the ones getting shortchanged.

The familiar pattern theoretically goes:

1. Aces > Mid-Init

2. Swarms > Aces

3. Mid-Init > Swarms

The problem is that that third one just isn't true most of the time. People are complaining that the second one is true but it should be true. Obviously good play should be able to reverse any of those outcomes but this should be the expectation. Where aces and swarms are at in relation to each other and the competitive field at the moment seems fine. There are still a lot of losers though, and it seems odd to go back and forth buffing aces and then swarms and then aces and completely missing 80% of the I3-4 bits (notable exceptions like Cassian and Ten Numb notwithstanding).

1 hour ago, Greedo_Sharpshooter said:

cough scum "Illicits" needed something... they gave a nerf to Contraband Cybernetics so thats something.. . these still remain a big unexplored design space... a Block Hole you might say.

Upgrades have issues, period. Illicits have the same design space as all other upgrades. And people are unreasonably obsessed with that one upgrade type to remain unique to one faction.