Rikalonius
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Posts posted by Rikalonius
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That's a beautiful set of figs!
Thank you Rikalonius! I honestly don't think I would have managed to get this far were it not for the encouragement and support of the community
Well you certainly give back with your video series and the succinct tutorials that make us amateurs much better than we should be.
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Its a new trope, instead of lampshading something... we just force ghost it.
Why did XYZ? Easy, a force ghost did it.
I like it. It's a nice updating of the Wizard did it trope.
Sam Tomahawk reacted to this -
I finally saw the new Star Wars yesterday... and it was way better than I expected. I have to watch it a few more times to properly compare it, but right now it shot to number 1...
7, 5, 6, 3, 2, 1, 4. Poor acting and crappy dialog aside, I didn't mind the prequels or jar jar as much as some folk. 4 is at the bottom because I've seen them all so often, and that one happens to be the slowest one with the least stuff happening, so I'm starting to find it boring. I fall asleep usually around that scene where Han says 'boring conversation anyway'.
I've been enjoying both version so the clone wars series, and thanks to the cgi one, like Jar Jar a lot more now. I still need to get into Rebels.
Seriously? This is an indictment of current cinema where CGI is so easy to produce that people, some anyway, have begun to regard the second most complete movie in the series as "the most boring-est one". Now we must have explosions and flashy lights and crap all over the screen for 2 hours to qualify as a good film. Scandalous! If you compare Star Wars circa 1977 to The Force Awakens circa 2015 you have a film that was a technological marvel in its time to a film that is same old bag of... cgi tricks that exist in every other film. The Force Awakens is the 1977 equivalent of Starship Invasions. Its not the least bit revolutionary. Kylo Ren is sorry replica of Darth Vader. You won't see Kylo at the top of every movie bad guy list for the next 40 years. In 1977 there were lines around the block to see Star Wars. In 1978 there were lines around the block to see Star Wars. In 1979 there were lines around the block to see Star Wars. The Force Awakens in out DVD with very little fan-fare 5 months later. Pretty soon it will be forgotten as the suits start ramping up to Rogue One in the hopes of selling more toys. Hopefully that's a decent film, but I seriously doubt it.
Gordo Cambo and thestag reacted to this -
I thought about this before. i don't think changing the points total is a good idea. People will just bring more of the cheaper units. The core problem is still that the uniques, based on what the bring to the table, cost too much. THat doesn't change if you just make it an 80 point game. People just have to buy more miniatures. I think FFG going back an reassessing the cost of a some units is the only alternative, other than releasing whole new figures, which I'm not keen on. I hated that there were 6 different Darth Vader characters in Star Wars minis. It got to the point where every scene in every film required a new figure. Han Solo -- Millennium Falcon Bowel Evacuator.
I think you misunderstood what Inquisitorz and I were discussing. We were simply speculating on scaling the points so there was more room to differentiate figures at small point costs: so Gideon would cost 6 instead of 3 and Regular Stormtroopers would be 12 points. Using that 2x baseline there would be more room to fine-tune the costs of individual units. Power creep would not be the goal, nor would releasing many versions of the same characters.
Yeah, sorry if I went off on a tangent. I wasn't aiming that at you, I was aiming it FFG. I did misunderstand that you were going to scale up the lower cost figures. I personally think that there are far fewer figures that need to be scaled down, but that's just me. You are right, just adjusting the scale in either direction would help to make those higher cost figures more useful.
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The Suncrusher from the Jedi Academy Trilogy is more plausible than Starkiller Base.
Cavan of Courage and Ewoks Battle for Endor are both better movies than The Force Awakens.
The Starkiller base was bar none the worst of many bad decisions in The Force Awakens. It was classic sequel escalation. Oh we have a base the size of a small moon. Oh, we need a more bigger(er) base. Well why not a base that's the size of a whole planet. Yeah, and they dug it out in 30 years. Yeah, and it can suck in a star that is hundreds of thousands of times bigger than our planet, with no change in mass. Yeah! And then it can shoot out energy across an entire solar system! Yeah!
Someone either couldn't, or wouldn't explain that this was an even worse idea than a personal teleporter to the Klingon Homeworld. We all thought that without Lucas' iron hand at the helm, that better decisions would be made. Looks like Abrams is every bit Lucas equal in narcissism.
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Xwing is 100pts per list, with usually 2 to 8 ships. Ships range from about 12 pts for the cheapest things to 46 for Han Solo in the Falcon. That's base cost before upgrades.
So yes, there's a lot more flexibility points wise. That being said.... most upgrades are between 0-3 points with only a handful being 4-6. In that sense, the upgrade costs are similar to command deck costs... 0,1,2,3. It's not as limiting as 15pts but it's a similar range. Especially because you have limited types of upgrades... eg, One pilot skill, one missile, one crew etc...
I do agree that maybe a 100-50% points increase across the board would be better long term, but it also risks being too complicated. You could make 1000pt list like warhammer, but then you'd need to count each individial storm trooper, and have the flexibility of buying 2 or 4 or 7 of them. It would kind of defeat the whole purpose of how deployment cards work. And it would probably screw with the campaign too much.
I think maybe going to 80 point lists and most things costing double what they do now, would be an interesting compromise. It would certainly give more room to move with some of those 3 figure groups and some skirmish upgrades, but I don't think it would affect unique heroes too much.... though some of the overcosted stuff like dengar and boba fett could be more easily adjusted.
I thought about this before. i don't think changing the points total is a good idea. People will just bring more of the cheaper units. The core problem is still that the uniques, based on what the bring to the table, cost too much. THat doesn't change if you just make it an 80 point game. People just have to buy more miniatures. I think FFG going back an reassessing the cost of a some units is the only alternative, other than releasing whole new figures, which I'm not keen on. I hated that there were 6 different Darth Vader characters in Star Wars minis. It got to the point where every scene in every film required a new figure. Han Solo -- Millennium Falcon Bowel Evacuator.
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I hated The Force Awakens and I sincerely hope to NEVER see any figure from that or Rebels in IA. It is too late for X-Wing, darn-it, but the Ghost is a far cry from an Ezra mini.
patrickmahan reacted to this -
Here's a quick and dirty comparison i did not long ago
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Hcm8qq65Vq25UC0oz2VABTUAXjACvgZrSbLVMxO0MEQ/edit?usp=sharing
The rerolls are hard to calculate but they are very significant.
Without re-writing huge essays again, the basic rundown is that stormtroopers are more flexible and more consistent. Damage output can be similar in certain conditions but it's harder for rebel troopers to pull that off... requires more set up and better play. I also don't think the upgrade to elite rebel troopers is worth it, where as elite stormtroopers are amazing.
Stormtroopers are just easier to use, safer to use and generally just more efficient. You always get value for them in any situation.
That can also vary with some maps where movement might be less important or where there's better firing zones/corridors.
Basically it's not just a pure damage comparison. They aren't that far apart there... although again, the reroll is a pretty big deal. It's more about the flexibility and maneuverability.
This is as it should be. Stormtroopers are supposed to be shock troops. They aren't militia like the Rebel Troops are. You saw what happened to them on Tantive IV. They got that one because they were aiming and focused when he breached, but after that it was just a slaughter with blue shirts routing in panic.
Sam Tomahawk and locu reacted to this -
Mockery: Oh master, I love you, but I hate everything you stand for. Let's press our mucus covered lips together in the cargo hold.
Mockery: I do not trust you. I cannot trust anyone ever again!
Statement: Such pheromone driven responses make me want to press a blaster pistol to my behavioral core and pull the trigger.
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This is a great discussion that I think needs to be had. I'm not opposed to cheaper, or more powerful uniques, I just want the developers to have a system to assess cost that is not arbitrary, and takes these in-obvious factors into account. I was guilty of it as well, and till it was pointed out to me. I was comparing the single character with a single character in multi-unit group, and I can see now that isn't a fair comparison. You must compare the group as a whole. I don't thin a single character, even a Darth Vader or a Boba Fett should have the power multiple characters, so i support better assessing their cost. Not that FF will change it, but it would be nice to get a little consensus among players so that the information is out there in case an individual player wants to modify them as a house rule. As I've considered some of the things written in the Bespin thread, I agree those early uniques are priced too high.
lowercaseM and thereisnotry reacted to this -
I played a lot IA the last weeks.
And I even got the core 6 heroes finished.
I wanted a more or less coherent look for all 6, like a military squad. I also wanted to keep them close to the character cards.
Detailed shots of each char are on my website!
See: http://www.adpublishing.de/html/imperial_assault.html
Next are the Trandoshan hunters and the AT-ST.
Dang. Gideon looks crazy. Great work though.
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That's a good explanation. I don't have so much a problem with Bossk costing 8, though I think it should be 10, based on the arguments presented about earlier uniques being too high, but that it has wiped out some of my favorite character, though I like Bossk. Do you think that FF will errata a cost change? Or do you think they'll just make new figures of, say, Dart Vader, IG 88, Boba Fett, etc, down the road? What do you think is a more realistic cost for DV, BF, and IG88 now?
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Flying frog productions (FFP) has produced a co-OP dungeon crawl game called "Shadows of Brimstone". The rules aren't the greatest, but I am really digging the setting, so I would love to convert the IA ruleset for it.
I've thought about doing a conversion to play space hulk with the IA rules.
I disagree. I think the SoB rules are superior to Imperial Assault, but that is just me. They could be a little simpler in some areas, but then IA is a bit of an odd system since it is derived from another game. Of course SoB rules are like a more in-depth version of the rules for the board game Fortune and Glory, which I like a great deal.
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There were only a few undercosted units like the Royal Guards. The meta would still be all 4x4, if these units wouldn't have been nerfed. Therefore I'm fine with the nerfs,
To change all overcosted uniques would be too much, because except for Gideon all uniques of the first waves are too expensive. To fix them all, there would need to be a rules change, how uniques work in general, rather than fixing them one by one. Check: https://community.fantasyflightgames.com/topic/203432-fixing-uniques-for-skirmish/
That was a good thread. I still think an errata reassessing the cost of older unique figures maybe the best answer, but going forward I hope we don't keep seeing more and more abilities added to figures unless they are cost appropriate. That all being said, I think Bossk still costs too little for what he is capable of.
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I agree. What people need to remember about Bossk is he's more expensive than a pair of elite tusken raiders, which gives you more health, more attacks, and one more figure. That last one is super important as it means losing one doesn't automatically give your opponent points, and you are better able to contest objectives. In campaign, board presence of uniques is also limited so for uniques to matter they need to be sufficiently tough and dangerous that ignoring them is dangerous. Plus they can't be reinforced but they still take up an open group, so you have one shot to make them useful. Additionally they have to be at least as dangerous anything else you could deploy or it isn't worth it. For all these reasons most uniques aren't considered worth it in the campaign. IG-88 costs as much as a group of elite royal guards. For the same points the guards buff allies, have the same amount of health, comparable damage, can be reinforced and redeployed, are faster, and you get two of them. While iggy might be a match for one elite guard, two?Most Uniques from the first waves were extremely overcosted. This is what makes them unplayable, not the power creep.
I think the new Uniques have proper points costs.
I would like to see a villain who isn't tough on his own but buffs allies to the point that not taking him out hurts you. They tried this with Somos and Soren but really over costed them. Somos should be like 5 points. Yes that's pretty cheap and the about cost of an elite officer for a (mostly) superior figure, but remember: he can't be redeployed, so when he's gone, he's gone. He needs to have a discount in campaign to account for such a risky investment. Alternatively he could afford to be boosted in his abilities. I think he should have an ability where friendly troopers don't block your line of sight. That way you can keep him behind the front lines shooting, while still using his command ability. That would, I feel, be enough of a that that the rebels would have to take him on, and in skirmish that would help him as well, with the added benefit of enhancing tactical play.
That's a very thoughtful post. I was wondering if there were any non-unique figures that could be judged at comparable cost. So while, I party agree, especially about the part that you get two characters, let's break it down point by point.
The biggest issue I have is that Bossk has 3 abilities that do not require surge. And his one surge ability, 2 pierce, has a 50% chance of being available per turn based on his green dice. The Tusken are mellee and not ranged, and while a red and a green dice would normally be low on accuracy, the creators have decided to give Bossk two free accuracy so he has a 100% chance for 3 accuracy, a 50% chance for 4 or above, and a 16.6% chance for 5 accuracy. So while he is medium range, he is still ranged. The elite Tuskens, both of them are given +1 damage, and Bossk is given +2 damage. That would probably be fair if that was Bossk's only free ability, but he also has the accuracy, and a guarantee of at least one block.
Now if we compare their abilities, the Tuskens can shoot their ginormous musket for up to 5 accuracy and up to 4 damage, but can't apply any other abilities. That's not bad. Bossk gets indirect fire, and while I can't fully make it out, I don't think it specifically says that you can't use other abilities, I'm pretty sure you cannot apply Bossk's +2 damage to the splash. I could be wrong. Still his grenade is a pretty powerful ability for dealing with lesser characters. But now we come to the creme dela crème ability. The ability to regenerate 3 health (and mitigate one damage with a block) every turn without spending a surge. That to me seems the tipping point in saying Bossk is under cost at 8 points.
lowercaseM reacted to this -
And whats worse is that they are nerfing the old figures like Royal Guards. I'm not going to argue whether they deserved the nerf or not, but nerfing the old figures and introducing these new powerful ones is pretty much saying "Buy our new stuff or get left in the dust."I think this is accurate, but that is the way of Fantasy Flight. Always be selling. I can understand, based on this figure, that other uniques are over priced, but 8 points, for 3 non-surge abilities that can be used every round and 3 regeneration, every round? That's insane for 8 points.
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The red jerseys on the Rebel Troopers is very apropos.
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I don't have an answer, but only to say, will this trend continue? Is Bossk rightly costed for his abilities, or is he under cost? I'd much rather the FAQ adjusted the cost of earlier units, if, and only if, their cost is too high. What I'm concerned about is arbitrary cost. Cannot the developers have internal charts to determine the cost of a unit based on its power? All I'm asking for is a standard that prevents new units from pushing out old units making them unplayable until a new unit of the same character comes around.
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I absolutely love the Echo Base troopers. It all fine work, but those stood out for me.
Malev Da Shinobi reacted to this -
Wow, Bossk embarrasses IG-88 in terms of power, despite the latter being 150% of the cost. Passive +2 damage, AoE secondary attack that ignores defensive dice and can hand out strain, passive Recover, passive negative condition removal etc. Ignoring the difference in mobility he might be better than Boba Fett.
FFG is finally getting around to making uniques worth their points
Yeah he's better than Boba relative to his cost, three attack dice and 6 speed still makes Boba a great unit. But man, that built in +2 damage is insane. FFG finally realized that no one wants to sink more than 10 points into a single unit. Really glad we're starting to get strong uniques at affordable price points, I feel like that gives the games a lot more flavor.
But I feel like the main thing that's missing from the game as a whole is support units for Scum. Without a cheap, 2-3 cost support unit like gideon/3P0/Imperial officer, it just feels like there's something obviously absent from the Scum faction. I get that it's not really in line with Mercs thematically, since they're bounty hunters that work a lone and all that, which I imagine is why we're missing something for that role. Even something like Luke that offers an AOE bonus to friendlies, maybe something like Xizor. That's about the only thing holding me back from playing Scum competitively right now.
I disagree. This is what I hated about the direction that Star Wars minis took. Units shouldn't have arbitrary costs. They should be costed based on their power. Making units that are more powerful than other units who cost more is a recipe for extreme imbalance. It leads to General Obi Wan Kenobi. People who would rather play with the earlier units, simply because they like them, can't because the meta game has been altered by bad cost practices. It is what leads to boring tournaments were everyone uses mirror squads because to do otherwise would be working from a disadvantage.
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I really hope for more consistancy in canon under Disney supervision.
First, the Clone Wars cartoon was canon. Then there was the Clone Wars animated series and the cartoon was removed from canon. Anakin having a Padawan? The Ones? Mortis? A lot of rubbish there.
First, "Han shot first." I never understood that Phrase, because "Only Han shot." would be correct. Then Greedo shot first. Then the both shot at the same time.
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Under Lucas supervision, canon was inconstant and inconsistant. I don't think that Disney will do similar rubbish.
It started really bad with Ahsoka. It managed to become endearing for a bit, and then Darth Maul came back to life and I abandoned it completely. As much as I knew Filoni did this just to put his finger in the eye of Mando fans, I wasn't even upset with a pacifist Mandalorian government, given how many times they'd been beaten in the past, but Duchess Satine was just too much. She was really and awful character.
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I never said I hated TFA or Rebels. But I do stand by my position that TCW is greater than Rebels and TCW shouldn't have been cancelled prematurely in favor if developing a new show, and that the EU is greater than the likes of the atrocity that was Aftermath.
I wouldn't say it was cancelled prematurely. It told all the stories it could tell. It only lasted about 2 and a half years and there were nearly six seasons of episodes.
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Um... Luke's father fought in the Clone Wars, but was betrayed and murdered by Vader. Obi-Wan helped Leia's 'father' in the Clone Wars. Luke is only 19 in ANH, so right from the start the Clone Wars were one generation ago. No chance the Clone Wars were really long ago.
First, we must remember that Vader was never intended to be Luke's father. Second we must remember that Leia was really never meant to be Luke's sister. So, how does the scenes on Tatooine transpire.
Leia hologram "General Kenobi. Years ago, you served my father in the Clone Wars. Now he begs you to help him in his struggle against the Empire. I regret that I am unable to present my father's request to you in person, but my ship has fallen under attack and I'm afraid my mission to bring you to Alderaan has failed. I have placed information vital to the survival of the Rebellion into the memory systems of this R2 unit. My father will know how to retrieve it. You must see this droid safely delivered to him on Alderaan. This is our most desperate hour. Help me, Obi-Wan Kenobi. You're my only hope."
Now even taking into account that Bail, later named, was Leia's adoptive father, she only says "years ago" not generations ago. Now what does Obi Wan say to Luke. First, he dismisses what Owen has told Luke, which was that his father served as a navigator on a spice freighter. Obi Wan elucidates that his uncle didn't hold with "his father's" ideals and felt he should stay here (Tatooine) and not have gotten involved. This implies that Anakin, we'll call him, though he goes unnamed until Jedi, was from Tatooine, or at least lived here with his brother. There is, to me, no other way to interpret that. Then he tells Luke a little bit about their meeting, which must have been years later:
Obi Wan: "He was the best star-pilot in the galaxy, and a cunning warrior. I understand you've become quite a good pilot yourself. And he was a good friend. Which reminds me..."
Now i don't want to belabor all this. Let's move foward to the key moment. Luke asks, how did my father die?Obi Wan: "A young Jedi named Darth Vader, who was a pupil of mine until he turned to evil, helped the Empire hunt down and destroy the Jedi Knights. He betrayed and murdered your father. Now the Jedi are all but extinct. Vader was seduced by the dark side of the Force."So when Vader does this; and let me add Obi Wan says to him on the Death Star "Only a master of evil, Darth" the film established the Darth was his first name. It wasn't meant to be a title, but that, like many things, was changed. Anyway Luke must have been either conceived or born at this time, and it is obvious from ANH that Obi Wan was in fact protecting and watching over him. In any case there is no indication the Clone Wars were that long ago.For the Greedo and Han shoot out. Lucas pulled the same thing that Spielberg did with the shotguns into 2-way radios. Han shooting first was character establishing. It makes his redemption more satisfying. I don't care what Lucas says, he's a proven liar when it comes to Star Wars lore. It was clearly not his original intention, but he revisited in a sense of guilt, which was unnecessary.Sam Tomahawk and DerBaer reacted to this
I wanna fight about Star Wars
in Star Wars: Imperial Assault
Posted
Natalie Portman would have done a fine job. Lucas' dialog has been iffy since Star Wars, but others challenged him before the prequels. George just wasn't up to given Portman a challenge worthy of her skill, which is sad. Even Hayden could have been better with a better script. I'm not everyone will agree, but I think Red Letter Media with their Plinkett parody review of the prequels, but mainly TPM and AOTC really exposes the plethora of problems with the prequels.