A Problem for the Game

[drunkensith 104]

4 hours ago, ozmodon said:

I love the word frequently!  I bet it wasn't  more than twice per game. There was a price that had to be paid. Now with Fast  Hands and Force Speed it just happens for Free!  That being said, I tried and took out Fast Hands from my Jango, Veers deck. It took the synergy from it. People take time building decks around Characters  they love, only to have them killed in turn one. Often before they can even activate.  The designer talks about diminishing results from consecutive actions. The saddest part of this is, okay action one I do 5 damage then action 2 I do 3 damage followed by action 3 I only do two damage. That's till 10 damage in one turn and your character is still dead. 

How often has this happened to you? ive played poe/maz for weeks now, probably close to 50 games and never been able to kill someone turn 1. I know the deck is capable of it with a optimal opening hand and your oppent not removing any dice, but I don't see it happening like everyone makes it out to be happening.

[ozmodon 535]

Jango, Veers  can about  in 4 games.

[ZachsDestiny 8]

4 hours ago, JonasBenz said:

Oh yeah, I don't believe they would re-release Poe. Something as simple as making Fast Hands yellow character only would be plenty.

Then Aurra Sing becomes Top tier!

[Buhallin 4,563]

With the next starter set hitting right around the time of Last Jedi, I think a new version of Poe for the starter isn't all that crazy an idea.

[JoeyBriefcase 107]

Well, post errata have few qualms. Now all folks have to do is kill Maz.

[ozmodon 535]

On 7/4/2017 at 6:02 AM, Vitalis said:

Sure to make it optimal, but it can work just fine without it.  I dont have exact decklist in front of me but it goes more or less:

Hoth, eRey, eQuigon
2x Lightsaber
2x Force Protection
2x Force Throw
2x Force Training
2x Jedi Robes
1x Vibro (i can't get hold of second one...thats only reason why not 2)
1 Luke Lightsaber
1 Makashi

2xIt Binds All Things
1x Your Eyes Can Deceive You

2x Synchronicity
2x Deflect
2x Riposte
2x Defensive Stance
2x Caution
1x My Ally is the Force
1x High Ground
1x Guard


More or less i write it from memory  As you can see most rares are rather cheap defensive ones, and commons/uncommons are dead cheap to get and make most of this deck. Key is to play it slow, even get one of your chars to low hp just to build up the momentum - after force protection is up and running only vibros are dangerous (i guess i need second Guard and You Eyes... in here, but makashi can do the trick too).

Makashi training may very well be the best card in the set, defiantly  take two of them. Qui-Gon, Rey can wreck consistently. Granted Poe, Maz, has a high ceiling and is easy to play. But I've  seen Qui-Gon, Rey take Poe easily 

Edited July 12, 2017 by ozmodon

[KalEl814 1,510]

On 7/5/2017 at 1:29 PM, Buhallin said:

The idea that any amount of action cheating justifies an unlimited amount of action cheating is just dumb, and it's an argument that needs to die.

If only that was the argument I made!

Edited July 12, 2017 by KalEl814

[Joelist 148]

On 7/7/2017 at 1:15 PM, JonasBenz said:

Well, post errata have few qualms. Now all folks have to do is kill Maz.

That was the way to attack Poe-Maz even before the erratum on Fast Hands - now it is more so the case. 

[Buhallin 4,563]

2 hours ago, KalEl814 said:

If only that was the argument I made!

Then maybe you could clarify what your argument actually was?  Because you dropped "Action cheating was there in Awakenings" like it meant something, without elaboration.  I may have incorrectly assumed the boilerplate argument.

[Kyle Ren 6,817]

I think what KalEl814 said is that action chaining isn't a new thing, it's another strategy inherent to this game, just like dice control, hand control, deck milling, support playing, and upgrade building are all also meant to be legitimate ways to try to win. 

I think what I'm understanding from you, Buhallin, is that the action chains have reached a length at which they're too powerful. I do agree that of the aforementioned strategies, action chaining has become perhaps more powerful than any of the other strategies. However, what I think KalEl814 meant was that all of the strategies have gotten a bit stronger, because new cards have been added. Many more dice control cards have been added, making dice control better. Jyn Erso and Blackmail hit hands harder than other stuff did in the past. Decks get milled harder by stuff like Krayt Dragon Howl and Con Artist. Supports are easier to afford than ever before with Unkar-based decks. There's more upgrades to go around, and IG-88 and FN-2199 have more tricks to use them with.

I think both of you have very valid points - action chaining to avoid getting dice controlled isn't a new strategy, but it perhaps is much more powerful now than the other methods of playing. Most decks at this point require some level of action chaining to survive (Fast Hands, Force Speed, etc.). An important thing to also keep in mind is that a really good deck combines all the elements, so you're just as unlikely to beat a speedy deck with an unwieldy, slow deck as you are to beat a powerful upgrade and support-based deck with a speedy deck that has no dice control. At some point, hopefully we will see a game where all six methods (and maybe more) of trying to win share an even playing field, and a good deck will incorporate aspects of all of the methods.

Edited July 12, 2017 by Kieransi

[Buhallin 4,563]

2 hours ago, Kieransi said:

I think what KalEl814 said is that action chaining isn't a new thing, it's another strategy inherent to this game, just like dice control, hand control, deck milling, support playing, and upgrade building are all also meant to be legitimate ways to try to win. 

Someone's come up with a new LOTR combo deck which will beat 90% of scenarios on turn 1.  It used card draw, and resource gaining, and recursion from the discard.  Each of these is a legitimate way to win the game, but in this combination it gets silly.

"Hey, there's action cheating, and there's supposed to be action cheating, and action cheating should contribute to winning games" is a perfectly true statement, and also perfectly irrelevant.  Nobody is saying that action chaining shouldn't exist, but it is inherently in conflict with the things that a lot of people find appealing about the way Destiny plays.  That doesn't mean it shouldn't exist, but it does need to be carefully balanced.  It would be like a number of dice in Empire at War having identical sides on all 6 sides - consistent dice are part of the game, but completely removing the randomness would overbalance it.

The question I was asking was how intended the current balance point is for action cheating, because it's definitely different now than Awakenings.  What's the actual target?  Did Awakenings underdo it, and SoR is the goal, or was Awakenings the target and SoR overdid it?  For those of us who think the back-and-forth interaction is most of what makes Destiny a good game, it's a very critical question.

And it's one that, to a certain extent, has been answered.  The Fast Hands errata not only fixed one of the primary speed problems, it explained that change in exactly the terms many of us have been complaining about.  I'm still not entirely sure that FFG wants the balance point at the same place I do, and certainly not convinced that they're good enough to land it there even if they do, but it is reassuring to know that (fanboy defenses aside) they did think it was a problem.

[Amanal 2,557]

The process of how your deck aims at winning, be that mill, action advantage, dice control and so on all matter. If you have a fairly close level of balance between all these things  you end up with a very healthy game that will remain remarkably fun to play. If you over balance one of these game play aspects over the others then the game isn't as fun, because your choice of what to play is defined by that imbalance.

I think you can be a little bit out, but at no time should we ever hope to see a single strong win strategy.

Rey is likely to become a problem as more cards add ambush to the game. Usually you play a card and gain an action, but with ambush cards and Force Speed you can gain enough actions to roll in, focus and deal damage. You could at best in Destiny Roll and Resolve another Character by careful timing of cards, we would when it happened see our opponents actions as "clever play", now we get more resentful as it is just a rush of cards and luck of rolls.

I think we have all lost games where our opponents surprised us with a fantastic play of cards, and I have had many a great and enjoyable loss when that happened. I want more of that game. The game where Rey accumulates 6 actions(I exaggerate!), that isn't half as much fun and isn't the game we ultimately want.

[AlexW 2,902]

18 minutes ago, Amanal said:

 

Rey is likely to become a problem as more cards add ambush to the game. Usually you play a card and gain an action, but with ambush cards and Force Speed you can gain enough actions to roll in, focus and deal damage. You could at best in Destiny Roll and Resolve another Character by careful timing of cards, we would when it happened see our opponents actions as "clever play", now we get more resentful as it is just a rush of cards and luck of rolls.

I know people mention Rey a lot, but Nines seems very problematic as well.    As more weapons are introduced, either cheaper but especially more reliable, his ability gets insane.

[Mace Windu 1,173]

15 minutes ago, AlexW said:

I know people mention Rey a lot, but Nines seems very problematic as well.    As more weapons are introduced, either cheaper but especially more reliable, his ability gets insane.

Yeah 9's is the new boggyman I think, not sure if anyone watched the extremely brief final game from the X-wars event, but the short story is that the 9's/Unkar/Trooper deck dealt 11 damage to Poe on round 1!!! Poe/Maz player conceded second action of round 2.

Admittedly Unkar ripping the U-wing from the Poe/Maz players hand for 5 resources was super relevant but the fact that 9's got to roll the dice for vibroknucklers and Riot baton twice round 1 was pretty bananas.

[Amanal 2,557]

I think our bogyman got very lucky, hence this isn't a problem as much as an excuse to buy a lottery ticket. However, we have seen some high cost support cards, and it has been hinted that they will become more playable, so who is to say?

That said a more balanced game with a varied meta is what we want, so as to the question, does FN really put pressure on the deck building strategies as to reduce the variety? Of that I am not so sure.

[Amanal 2,557]

With regards to action cheating Fast Hands and Force Speed are the main problem cards because they are permanently added to a character and compound the effect of the action cheat on that character or give a character the ability to action cheat when it has none. These cards can almost provide enough actions for players to finish and claim the battlefield before their opponent has had the ability to do anything significant. (The fencer in me says figure out a counter, but in reality I am left wondering, maybe just ban them and you make the rest of the game far more fun?)

Cards with ambush or one-off events are "surprises" that take effect once and go away, plus they usually cost 1 or more, and therefore can be disrupted. I love surprising my opponent with such cards and it would be hypocritical of me to suggest that I should be the only player with surprises. Why should I not enjoy the play of Backup Muscle after my opponent claims to sneak 1 damage on a character and kill it at the start of the next turn and yet get all upset when he does the same to me?

FN, Rey, Maz and Jango are not a great issue, you know they are on the table from the moment that get put down and they can do what they can do.

[Vitalis 1,012]

On 7/6/2017 at 2:55 AM, ZachsDestiny said:

Then Aurra Sing becomes Top tier!

Reading that post errata, going to event today with fast hands Aurra deck - priceless

[ZachsDestiny 8]

4 hours ago, Vitalis said:

Reading that post errata, going to event today with fast hands Aurra deck - priceless

Awesome, let me know how you do, huge fan of Aurra and her nasty fingers. Shes great with fast hands.

[HoodieDM 320]

14 hours ago, Amanal said:

I think our bogyman got very lucky, hence this isn't a problem as much as an excuse to buy a lottery ticket. However, we have seen some high cost support cards, and it has been hinted that they will become more playable, so who is to say?

That said a more balanced game with a varied meta is what we want, so as to the question, does FN really put pressure on the deck building strategies as to reduce the variety? Of that I am not so sure.

I think it's a bit of both actually.

I think Unkar and FN9's should be limited to once or twice per round. Especially when the character cost is so efficient. 10/13...WTF?? And it's not like it has a real restriction on it. I mean you could conceivably unlimited Unkar + FN9 combo. You could Unkar own dice to get the resources. Play ANY upgrade on FN that has at least one 3 side facing of whatever...can even be modifier...and play that into play. Then just keep overwriting FN9s upgrade until you or your opponent have run out of cards or to the point of literally killing someone turn 1. Heck Unkar can pluck a card out of opponents for 4-5 resources, play Slave I. Roll that die out, do his thing again to pluck another 4-5 resource card, then play another support. I mean yes, the opponent would have to have 4-5 cost cards in hand, but it's not unlikely against an ePalp, Poe/Maz, any FN deck running 3-4 cost upgrades, a mono blue Hero deck with Grand Master coming. He can single handily put out 2-4 high cost supports in one turn...

Killing someone turn 1 should NEVER be the case with action cheating. I'm okay if Vader with a Vibroknife rolls "god" dice and gets 8 dmg and kills an 8 (or less) hp character. MOST times every player should have at least 1 option to react to that. If they didn't draw/play any dice removal, that's their choice, but they at least got a turn. With Unkar/FN9's, you can't do anything because you literally get to roll out and immediately resolve with 9's. That ability is just F-ing insane...especially on a 10/13 character. Had it been on Mace Windu at 16/22...then I'm okay with that, because that's your deck. He's not even playing elite FN either, it's a single die. 10 points can fit into just about ANYTHING.

FFG has no concept on how powerful abilities are on characters. I mean look at K2, the guy is so restricted, yet is 15/20...WTF?? But yet FN and Unkar are running around at 10/13. Heck, Admiral Ackbar/Mon Mothma are no where near that, yet 10/14 (11/14 latter)...umm...hello? They got Snaps right at least. They didn't get Asaaj right though (hooray for once screwing up a Villain!). In the end, Unkar and FN9 should be erratad as well. Not for potential of "god rolls"...just for unlimited action sequence of things...especially without a chance to react unless opponent literally rolls blanks all day.

~D

Edited July 13, 2017 by HoodieDM

[Kyle Ren 6,817]

This game also just needs more cheap unique characters. Non-uniques (except red villains due to Endless Ranks) don't seem to be cutting the mustard, so Rey, Nines, Kylo, Unkar, Maz, and Bala are so common just because of their low cost. It's kind of annoying that the (typically) three unique characters for each faction per wave seem to usually cost 12/16, 14/18, and 15/20, give or take a point or two. Those characters that cost less than 14 for elite are so useful, and there's only five like that in the whole game (out of 35 total unique characters)! 

And, I really think that you're on target that they're too good for the cost, D. Compare Rey and Luminara Unduli for example. Same health, similar dice, about equally useful abilities (arguably Rey's is better) and yet Luminara costs 5 points more? What about Nines versus Greivous? Slightly better dice on Greivous, much better ability on Nines, and Nines is 5 points cheaper? Kylo is almost as useful as dark-side Anakin in the Emotwins deck (not sure I like that name but that's what people are calling it). Bala helped take the first world championships, and he still keeps showing up in more decks. Unkar is disgusting - he's one of the most broken characters in the game right now in my opinion. And we all know Maz is a problem.

I usually play Rey, and I'm starting to hate playing her. The Jedi are my favorite characters, so I just really like playing blue hero decks, but what else can I do? As far as I can tell, the best blue hero decks are still eObiWan/Rey, eLuke/Rey, eQuiGon/eRey, and eLuminara/eRey. I think Rey's a good character in the movie, and I don't want her to dissapear, but there's pretty much no way to win a game (unless it's totally casual) with blue heroes if you're  not using Rey. I really want to see some more variety in this game, but there's really no options for blue heroes at this point, because we still only have one character in that optimal price range. And, arguably, we only have one really good character period.

So yeah, I need FFG to quit it with trying to make every character compete for cost and power (like K-2SO and Sabine both costing 20) and instead fill in more options for cheaper characters. I'm kind of sick of having all my decks be Rey+(some other character), or FN+(some other character), etc.

Edited July 13, 2017 by Kieransi

[Amanal 2,557]

@HoodieDM and @Kieransi: Great points, I think the points system for the characters may giving too much weight to the dice and not enough to the card ability.

 

[Joelist 148]

I'm not seeing FN as being some sort of unlimited action cheat - his ability is not free and is basically a limited, built in Fast Hands. You specifically have to play a weapon on him to activate it and it lets you roll in THAT weapon and resolve. I suppose in theory you could play one weapon after another on him and keep overwriting - of course the moment you hit a side you  can't resolve (blank or a resource cost side you can't pay for) it's over. 

I always figured his best use was to roll in the weapon before activating him. Resolve that die then roll him in so the weapon gets to fire again. Plutt can be a real pain in mill mode so long as your deck features getting a lot of dice out there to get multiple combinations of 3 or more, otherwise he is worse than useless. 

 

Right now I am tuning my eJyn-Maz mill deck. In teresting thing is so far the Maz ability is not coming into play a lot (because I think I have been lucky and gotten a Fast Hands on Jyn quickly). I was speculating about eJyn-Padme but I think I'm sticking with Maz as she has two focus sides (and when she gets her Goggles it gets better still) so she hopefully gets a focus, uses it to focus Jyn correctly and the mill goes on.

[Buhallin 4,563]

1 hour ago, Joelist said:

I'm not seeing FN as being some sort of unlimited action cheat - his ability is not free and is basically a limited, built in Fast Hands. You specifically have to play a weapon on him to activate it and it lets you roll in THAT weapon and resolve. I suppose in theory you could play one weapon after another on him and keep overwriting - of course the moment you hit a side you  can't resolve (blank or a resource cost side you can't pay for) it's over. 

This is exactly what people are doing with FN, and it's winning games.  It's not "over" once you hit a blank with the chain either.  You either accept it and just go to the next weapon/die (because there's very little cost to doing so) or you then activate FN, hope to catch the bad die with a reroll into something that can be resolved, and then start playing new ones again.

[Joelist 148]

The wording of his ability is pretty specific. You play a weapon on him, roll the die of that weapon and if able resolve that die. Playing another weapon on him is another action, so unless the weapons have Ambush the other player gets a turn. So strictly its not a chain. It's sort of a "repeat weapon loop" but your opponent can indeed play in between. 

[Mace Windu 1,173]

25 minutes ago, Joelist said:

 so unless the weapons have Ambush

you mean like Vibroknucklers or Vibroknife or Holdout blaster or (insert 1-2 new Ambush weapons from  EaW)

Believe me it happens enough to be really annoying, and its only going to get worse with more weapons that will have more consistent unmodified damage sides like riot baton, rocket launcher and Vibroknucklers.

to top it off, those die rolls that are unable to be resolved become food for Unkar more often than not.

Edited July 14, 2017 by Mace Windu