So, we all know there are a myriad of pilots and upgrades that are typically not seen in competitive play. How would you rebalance the following to make them more competitive for their cost? (note: don't change their cost, change their effect)

• Expose
• Marksmanship
• Proximity Mines
• Proton Torpedos
• Maarek Steele
• Winged Gundark
• Fel's Wrath
• Horton Salm
• Arvel Crynyd

(Disclaimer: I'm aware there are probably some folks out there who have run these things in a competitive environment. However, it's been my experience through many tournaments that the cards on this list are rarely seen.)

Here are some of my thoughts:

• Expose
  • At the beginning of the Combat Phase, you may increase your primary weapon value by 1 and decrease your agility value by 1 until the end of the round. Then receive a stress token.
• Marksmanship
  • When attacking, you may spend a Focus token to change one of your results to a result and all your other results to results. Then receive a stress token.
• Proximity Mines
  • Change to drop before revealing manuever dial, no Action.
• Proton Torpedos
  • Attack [Target Lock]: Spend your target lock and discard this card to perform this attack. You may spend a Focus token to change one blank result and one result to results. Attack value: 4. Range: 2-3.
• Maarek Steele
  • When a ship at Range 1 is dealt a faceup Damage card, instead draw 2 Damage cards, choose 1 to deal, and discard the other.
• Winged Gundark
  • When attacking at Range 1, you may change 1 of your blank results to an result.
• Fel's Wrath
  • When the number of damage cards assigned to you equals or exceeds your hull value, receive a Focus token. You are not destroyed until the end of the round.
• Horton Salm
  • Give the man an EPT!
• Arvel Crynyd
  • You may declare an enemy ship inside your firing arc that you are touching as the target of your attack. When attacking, ships you are touching may not spend Evade tokens.

I don't know how changing the effects, like marksmanship and proton torps, to allow for greater usage. Usually, when trying to buff something, you don't add more costs or pre-requesiquets to garner greater usage.

It's a matter of balance. These cards, as written, are typically considered overcosted for their benefits, but sometimes you can't just add more benefit without making them overpowered. So, you replace an existing cost with a different one (in the case of Marksmanship) to give it greater flexibility, or you add a cost to balance out what would otherwise be an overpowered buff (in the case of the Torps).

If you think that Marksmanship is too expensive or not getting used enough, you're not using it right. Like most upgrades, its effectiveness is tied to the ship its attached to. It shines on any of the ships that can also use Gunner, b/c its effect carries over to the Gunner's attack too. Ditto with any ship using a Cluster Missile.

Yes, it sucks on ships with only 2 attack, just like Stealth Generator sucks on a Y-Wing.

I would still say that any EPT that requires another 5 point (Gunner) upgrade or 4 point (Cluster Missile) missile to be useful is a suboptimal EPT. Especially considering that Focus tokens cost no squad points and accomplish almost the same thing.

For the most part, Focus tokens are just as good as Marksmanship with Gunner, because unless you get a really good roll on the first attack, you usually just let the attack ride and go for the Gunner shot.

And Cluster Missiles are single use. I wouldn't pick up a 3 point EPT so I can use it "optimally" once (or even twice on a Bomber).

Not to mention the fact that Focus is useful for defense.

I've tried time and time again to make Marksmanship useful, and I've never felt that it was any better than just having a Focus.

Any "This needs fixing!" list that makes Maarek weaker seems highly suspect.

They really don't need fixing. Are some of them very limited use? Yeah. Do some of them just outright suck? Sure. Not everything can be gold, and we really don't need a mass of tinkering and balance errata to the point that half the cards we've got don't do what they're printed as.

You also don't know what will happen come next release. As Chrome points out, Marksmanship was generally considered overpriced right up until Han and Gunner showed up. Better to just leave it alone.

Any "This needs fixing!" list that makes Maarek weaker seems highly suspect.

This isn't a "this needs fixing!" rant. This is a list of cards that rarely see competitive play, and an inquiry how people would change them to make them more competitive. Also, scroll back up and read Maarek again, carefully. He's quite a bit more useful with this wording.

Any "This needs fixing!" list that makes Maarek weaker seems highly suspect.

They really don't need fixing. Are some of them very limited use? Yeah. Do some of them just outright suck? Sure. Not everything can be gold, and we really don't need a mass of tinkering and balance errata to the point that half the cards we've got don't do what they're printed as.

You also don't know what will happen come next release. As Chrome points out, Marksmanship was generally considered overpriced right up until Han and Gunner showed up. Better to just leave it alone.

I'm not sure Maarek is weaker, He's now a good way to make sure your ships don't get killed by 2 damage criticals. As the new version seems to be any ship in Range 1 not just from your shooting and not just the enemy.. Saying that... I feel the X1 probably needs just a point drop across the board. It's not just Maarek that is overpointed it's all Advanced except possibly Vader.

They sure do seem overpriced for what you get, don't they? Like has been mentioned elsewhere, Vader is justifiable on his built-in alone, but the rest just cost too **** much.

Ah, I see the Maarek difference now. My bad on the misread.

<shrug> Still a pointless exercise, honestly. Makes for fun forum discussion, but mass errata for balance tinkering does nothing but destabilize the game. But I guess these things will keep going around from time to time.

Well, I mean....isn't discussion what we're here for?

Can't think of much else to do on these forums while we while away the months until Imperial Aces. Which, by the way.....I think Opportunist is probably the "Oops, we screwed up on Expose" replacement upgrade.

TBH I don't want tonnes of errata, I think the X1 is the only ship that really needs something. As that is a whole ship that is not being used.

The A-Wing and the Y-Wing are fine, they might not be being used everywhere, but people do use the A-Wing when they need a cheap missile carrier and the Y-Wing can be good with an Ion turret. But other than the occasional Vader I just don't see X1's being used at all.

The occasional upgrade being meh or very situational I don't see an issue with, they will over time be replaced by slightly more useful cards like the APT or Opportunist. And the same with the odd pilot that is very situational.

I'm all for this kind of thing but think re-costing is probably a more elegant solution. Well, that and titles.

Advanced should be dropped 1 pt across the board... even Vader. Yep, people load him up and make him viable, not people would still load him up and he might actually be useful. If you reduce by one and use some of these titles, advanced become pretty fun! If you don't reduce the costs, make these titles cost 1 less (except x7)

Advanced- Lord Vader's x1 (unique): free, add the elite pilot skill upgrade to your upgrade bar.

Advanced- Prototype x2: 1pt, add the systems upgrade to your upgrade bar.

Advanced- Prototype x3: 1pt, your firing arc is increased to 180 degrees.

Advanced- Prototype x7: 2pts, you may use the tie interceptor movement dial rather than the tie advanced movement dial.

Advanced- Prototype Aggressor: 1pt, you have a rear firing arc

Y-wing was close but just released too early. Hwk is a cheaper turret and the awing has missiles and is cheaper so here are a few variants:

Y-wing- BTL-S3: Free, add the crew upgrade to your upgrade bar. You lose the astromech slot.

Y-wing- BTL-A4, Longprobe: 1pt, add the systems upgrade to your upgrade bar. Add missile upgrade to your upgrade bar.

Y-wing- BTL-B: free, if you add no other upgrades/modifications to this ship, reduce it's cost by 1

I really like Awings but they feel just a bit too much. Here are some variants I like that spice it up a little.

A-wing- Rz-1 Interceptor: free, if you add no upgrades or missiles to this ship, reduce it's cost by 1.

A-wing- R22 Spearhead: free, add the crew upgrade to your upgrade bar

A-wing- Mark II: 1pt, your primary weapon firing arc is increased to 360 degrees.

A-wing- Green Leader (unique): free, you may take the boost action even if it would cause you to overlap.

I'm obviously not sure about the point costs. Anything that just adds an upgrade slot should be 0 or 1 and if it does cost points it should be worth more than 1 pt to make up for the fact that some of these ships are around a point over-costed anyway.

Considering 2 naked Y-wings made it to the top 8, I think they are fine. Sure, the variants would be nice, but hardly needed.

Think I'm with the others that changing too much just isn't going to happen, and i'm sure ffg hate changing the wording or the cost.

If you can find a way to tweek what the wording means I think you have more chance, or just add an EPT of coarse.

Having said that I would gladly drop the word primary from Expose so that it worked on all weapons, I think that might give it a boost in popularity.

Well, I mean....isn't discussion what we're here for?

Can't think of much else to do on these forums while we while away the months until Imperial Aces. Which, by the way.....I think Opportunist is probably the "Oops, we screwed up on Expose" replacement upgrade.

I was excited about Opportunist until I ran the numbers. Opportunist (at 4 points) is inferior to Push the Limit for focus + target lock (5 points on the TIE Interceptor, only 3 points on rebel ships) for almost any scenario.

I should clarify: inferior is the incorrect word, 4 dice + focus generally does about 10% more average damage than 3 dice + focus + target lock. However the standard deviation is much higher, so ironically your chance of getting at least 1 hit is better with F+TL unless your target has 5 evade dice.

PtL however is FAR more versatile. The only way that I see Opportunist being useful is if you can get a 2nd action from someone else to get Opportunist + Focus + TL, otherwise PtL is generally going to be the better choice outright - and it's cheaper.

PtL however is FAR more versatile. The only way that I see Opportunist being useful is if you can get a 2nd action from someone else to get Opportunist + Focus + TL, otherwise PtL is generally going to be the better choice outright - and it's cheaper.

Advantages of Opportunist over PtL:

- Doesn't require an action, so provides advantage even when stressed or when blocked, and doesn't lock you into greens the next turn. This cannot be overstressed (no pun intended). PtL's perma-stress scenario works well enough with Interceptors who can manage those 2-turns with a green, but it's far more painful on an X-wing or even a standard TIE.

- Exerts pressure on your opponent's decision-making. Especially on a lower-PS pilot (who hasn't fired yet), it can easily motivate an opponent to hold that focus rather than spending it to change that one eyeball to a hit. Just like Ten and the Autoblaster can be about pushing your opponent's action decision towards Evade, Opportunist can influence their decision to hold a token rather than spend it.

Push the Limit is (and hopefully always will be) the gold standard of EPT upgrades. But the comparative uses of Opportunist go well beyond the odds of hit generation.

Advantages of Opportunist over PtL:

- Doesn't require an action, so provides advantage even when stressed or when blocked, and doesn't lock you into greens the next turn. This cannot be overstressed (no pun intended). PtL's perma-stress scenario works well enough with Interceptors who can manage those 2-turns with a green, but it's far more painful on an X-wing or even a standard TIE.

IIRC, Opportunist's usage generates 1 stress point.

Edit: Yes, IRC, and on top of that... You can't use it while stressed. Your other point is totally valid, tough.

Marksmanship, as is, is not bad on a 3 attack ship. It's just that there are *better* choices.

hmm, I've had a similar thread over at BGG, http://boardgamegeek.com/thread/1064844/useless-cards-and-proposed-fixes

Here's a quick rundown:

Fel's Wrath:

> when he dies, he immediately gets 2 attacks, up to a maximum of 2 attacks per round

Arvel Crynyd

> when he hits stuff, he still gets his actions

> EPT slot

Awings in general

> decrease cost by 2 throughout

Ywings in general

> 1 proton slot changed into missile slot

> cost decreased by 1

> Horton and Grey to get EPT slot

Red Xwing

> EPT slot

TIEadv in general

> decrease cost by 2 throughout

> sensors slot

> Storm to get EPT slot

Maaaaaaaarek Steele

> decrease PS to 6 (this is actually a buff, so you can use squadleader on him much more easily, and his effect is more likely to hit hulls, after other higher PS ships have removed the target's shields

Winged Gundark

> no range restriction (or limit to range 1-2)

Shuttle in general

> rear firing arc please (that fires with atk2 instead of atk3), and white hard turn 2. Point cost to be adjusted upwards in light of these 2 upgrades

Jendon

> effect extends up to range 2

Dark Curse

> reverse ruling to deadeye and blaster turrets being usable against him

NightBeast

> reverse ruling about no free focus when stressed

Royal TIEint mook

> increase point cost by 1

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Deadeye

> 0 cost

Elusiveness

> effect occurs AFTER defender modifies his defense rolls.

Expose

> 3 cost

Daredevil

> 2 cost, rolls 1 dice instead of 2 if you do not have boost

Stealth Device

> 4 cost

ST-321 title

> 2 cost or 1 cost, that thing is definitely not worth 3 points

Maarek Stele

• When attacking with your primary weapon, you may chance results to results if you have no stress token.

I think this would fix him

In my book Expose is just fine. Slap it on Wedge, team him up with Biggs (as always) and some other dude/s (if you want to go crazy bring Luke and expose him too) and watch those two rip apart a ship every turn without even worrying about the drawback. If well flown it takes the opponent 2 turns to get rid of Biggs (if you go crazy on Biggs with some upgrades he might even be able to hold out 3 turns), two turns get 4 ties destroyed, and a lot of other lists weakened too. As soon as Biggs goes down it's all back to normal Wedge and buddies fighting their opponents (with the occasional Expose from Wedge when no/low risk of return fire), but probably with about half the opposing force destroyed or seriously damaged.

Expose is really good, but it comes with a serious drawback to balance it, which is ok for me. The reason you don't see it on tournaments? Don't know, maybe to tough to use it correctly, it's easier to leave out stuff like that and take another ship instead than to master these specials.

Shaadea: do the math

...

It is very ... dead serious very unlikely that FFG would change any cards that are out already. Well I wouldn't.

BUT there is a chance that there are other cards in future releases that make the dogs more attractive.

Expose is a dog. Maybe use it with Han - but there are better means to spend 4 points on Han.

Maarek is most definitly a dog, along with his nameless Tie Advanced fellows.

How could expose be attractive? Maybe with a pilot able to use 2 elites or get an elite free or by other means allowing the ship to Expose and focus a cheaper way like it is right now.

What upgrade card could make Maarek to become a star? Or at leas a less doggier dog?

More dice and or any means to enhance his chances to hit with a crit, either cheaper or more effective or even both.

Something like 'add one crit to your results then get a stress token' but this would be too mighty with other pilots like Wedge.

Its difficult to create a non-'TIE Advanced only' upgrade card without making other pilots even more attractive.

And adding a 'TIE Advanced only' upgrade card to fix this mess, the hell would break loose with people wanting the same deal for their beloved A-Wing or Y-Wing or whatsoever to come.

So just forget about the ineffective upgrade cards and tread Maarek and fellows like it never happened.

Tie Advanced is Vader and Vader only.

In my book Expose is just fine. Slap it on Wedge, team him up with Biggs (as always) and some other dude/s (if you want to go crazy bring Luke and expose him too) and watch those two rip apart a ship every turn without even worrying about the drawback. If well flown it takes the opponent 2 turns to get rid of Biggs (if you go crazy on Biggs with some upgrades he might even be able to hold out 3 turns), two turns get 4 ties destroyed, and a lot of other lists weakened too. As soon as Biggs goes down it's all back to normal Wedge and buddies fighting their opponents (with the occasional Expose from Wedge when no/low risk of return fire), but probably with about half the opposing force destroyed or seriously damaged.

Expose is really good, but it comes with a serious drawback to balance it, which is ok for me. The reason you don't see it on tournaments? Don't know, maybe to tough to use it correctly, it's easier to leave out stuff like that and take another ship instead than to master these specials.

Expose is horrible, unless you have another way to add a modifier (focus or TL). Rebels tend to be able to use it a lot better than imperials though, because they have more ways to effectively pass the much needed 2nd action, and their ships are more bulky. Imagine if you gave expose to a Saber, have a Howlrunner + squadleader nearby, and your Saber gets OHKOed by some random range 3 shot from Biggs, and there goes the entire combo.

when used on its own, Expose generates worse results than focus or TL, and that's not considering the drawbacks of eating 1 agility dice. I would not consider it being an action a drawback, since you now have a option to switch it on/off

- Exerts pressure on your opponent's decision-making. Especially on a lower-PS pilot (who hasn't fired yet), it can easily motivate an opponent to hold that focus rather than spending it to change that one eyeball to a hit. Just like Ten and the Autoblaster can be about pushing your opponent's action decision towards Evade, Opportunist can influence their decision to hold a token rather than spend it.

Push the Limit is (and hopefully always will be) the gold standard of EPT upgrades. But the comparative uses of Opportunist go well beyond the odds of hit generation.

This is why I'm excited for Opportunist. Does anyone want to see the A-wings or TIE's they are facing suddenly turn into Interceptors or X-wings? Push the Limit is amazing, sure. But Opportunist can play some mind games with the opponent, which is always a good thing in my book.