The race to the bottom, and how it should be addressed

[player3010587 693]

19 hours ago, dadocollin said:

OK, I talked to Kylo.  He's agreed to allow Null with Squad Leader into the squad as long as he agrees to take a single shot and then just ram himself into people while Kylo runs away after the initial engagement.  He's agreed to this conditionally, however, only if "Squad Leader" is re-named "Ship that gives me an extra action and then dies."

Kylo (not quite) Solo

TIE/vn Silencer - •Kylo Ren - 126
    •Kylo Ren - Tormented Apprentice (82)
        Proton Torpedoes (9)
        Proton Rockets (7)
        Afterburners (8)
        Supernatural Reflexes (12)
        Primed Thrusters (8)

TIE/fo Fighter - •“Null” - 35
    •“Null” - Epsilon Ace (31)
        •Squad Leader (4)

Total: 161/200

EDIT: It horrifies me that Null was actually designed to serve this exact purpose in Kylo points fortress lists...

I fly Null in a 200 pt extended/199 pt hyperspace list. Kylo flanks, but null offers Quickdraw a lock so that the sf has both juke and fcs fully operational. NEVER open an engagement with Null (unless an upcoming segnor's demands an I0 coordinate). If he defends, it must be because they boosted or such to him, and must now pay the price of juke on 4 locked dice. Pull the good ole Sloan trick: Null is R2 of Quickdraw, but R4 minimum of enemies. As the fight thickens, he can then engage, but the aces might need some more help.

[impspy 904]

35 minutes ago, player3010587 said:

I fly Null in a 200 pt extended/199 pt hyperspace list. Kylo flanks, but null offers Quickdraw a lock so that the sf has both juke and fcs fully operational. NEVER open an engagement with Null (unless an upcoming segnor's demands an I0 coordinate). If he defends, it must be because they boosted or such to him, and must now pay the price of juke on 4 locked dice. Pull the good ole Sloan trick: Null is R2 of Quickdraw, but R4 minimum of enemies. As the fight thickens, he can then engage, but the aces might need some more help.

Null was the MVP of one of my victories Sunday; limped on at 1 hull for 3 turns and kept my opponent from bullying Kylo long enough for me to win on points.

[dotswarlock 2,248]

On 12/16/2018 at 5:26 PM, Crit Happens said:

(...)

I believe that a simple change to game scoring should be made. Any unused squad points should count as points destroyed. You can still choose to take a deep initiative bid to guarantee moving last, but you're now giving your opponent a game scoring advantage. 

 

What are your thoughts about this idea? Do you have any other suggestions that better address the issue of intentional point fortresses from deep bids? Is this even a problem that needs to be addressed?

Let me sum up the problem and / or the source of the negative play experience.  If the bidding player scores enough points, he gets to flee the entire game unless he gets a perfect shot, encouraging slow play, defensive play and not engaging for a very long time.  I see where you are going with this.

 

There are 2 things that I think would help correct this:

- Rule wise: a tweek to your rule suggestion: "If the game goes to time, any unused squad points should count as points destroyed."

It's a minor modification, but this ensure that someone with a high bid that actually destroys the enemy fleet (therefore did not flee the entire game) should be deserving of getting a full score.  At the same time, this discourages fleeing through the entire game because that MOV gap is much larger.

 

- Design wise: I feel like FFG made a solid effort of having I5 and I6 squads / pilots that are really good.  I3 and I4 could use a bit more love.  Hopefully the 2 new factions will fill that design space.

 

That is all

 

Edited December 18, 2018 by dotswarlock

[Crit Happens 763]

I could definitely get on board with that tweak @dotswarlock. It encourages the point fortress player to engage, which is what we all want. 

[JasonCole 1,010]

I'd be fine with that too, or with unused squad points being assigned to the last remaining ship on the table with the highest relative health compared to threshold (i.e. if you bring 2 ships and a 20 point bid, one ship is gone and the other is 1/2 points, then you give up 10 of the 20 bid points - or if you keep one ship above 1/2 health, you keep all 20 points).

[thespaceinvader 15,392]

I'd be fully OK with that proposal for a change - if the game goes to time, unused poitns count as destroyed, rather than saved.  Makes bidding a lot more painful and makes fortressing a lot harder.

[GreenDragoon 4,472]

Yes, sounds like a good idea!

Any reason that speaks against it?

[JasonCole 1,010]

12 minutes ago, GreenDragoon said:

Yes, sounds like a good idea!

Any reason that speaks against it?

Given that FFG seems to be orienting to force a spacefight, it should go along with their "anit-fortressing" stance. The caveat that you only get it if you go to time means you don't get it if your opponent wipes you out, even if their last ship is in flames.

[underling 42]

A very easy method for handling initiative is one we developed locally for our dogfighting variant. For regular X-Wing I believe it could be handled the same.

The initiative is determined normally.

During the End Phase, the player with initiative has the option to pass the initiative to the opposing player. Note that the player may also keep it. We felt that handling it this way introduced a little more strategy than simply passing it back and forth.

It would be easy to incorporate, and doesn't change anything mechanically on how things work currently.

[Micanthropyre 247]

35 minutes ago, underling said:

A very easy method for handling initiative is one we developed locally for our dogfighting variant. For regular X-Wing I believe it could be handled the same.

The initiative is determined normally.

During the End Phase, the player with initiative has the option to pass the initiative to the opposing player. Note that the player may also keep it. We felt that handling it this way introduced a little more strategy than simply passing it back and forth.

It would be easy to incorporate, and doesn't change anything mechanically on how things work currently.

Thats pretty interesting on first read. 

[Cuz05 675]

1 hour ago, underling said:

A very easy method for handling initiative is one we developed locally for our dogfighting variant. For regular X-Wing I believe it could be handled the same.

The initiative is determined normally.

During the End Phase, the player with initiative has the option to pass the initiative to the opposing player. Note that the player may also keep it. We felt that handling it this way introduced a little more strategy than simply passing it back and forth.

It would be easy to incorporate, and doesn't change anything mechanically on how things work currently.

I like it. 

But I can imagine getting very bored of auto passing.

Personally, I'm almost always flying 200pts of I4 atm, partly because I can't be bothered to enter the bid war and partly because that whole deal feels like a trap, or a slope leading away from becoming a better player.

Start of game: *sighs* "I'll just keep initiative" 

[underling 42]

We developed it when we came up with our dogfighting variant. In that, both players run identical builds of two ships, and the builds are deliberately set up to have two pilots of identical PS scores. We had to have a way where one player wasn't stuck with the initiative the whole game.

With respect to auto-passing, it didn't always happen. True, once the ships closed, passing the initiative was usually the case. Every so often, though, someone would hold onto it so they could be sure of their next move. It works really well, and is not as cumbersome as it might sound.

Edited December 18, 2018 by underling

[Cuz05 675]

4 minutes ago, underling said:

We developed it when we came up with our dogfighting variant. In that, both players run identical builds of two ships, and the builds are deliberately set up to have two pilots of identical PS scores. We had to have a way where one player wasn't stuck with the initiative the whole game.

With respect to auto-passing, it didn't always happen. True, once the ships closed, passing the initiative was usually the case. Every so often, though, someone would hold onto it so they could be sure of their next move. It works really well, and is not as cumbersome as it might sound.

Oh I like it, I like it a lot. But it feels like the sort of thing that is great at a more casual level, where people are willing to experiment a bit more and probably know each other.

I just mean in a larger tournament setting, where you automatically know that the other fella is only begrudgingly accepting that he has to take it, before discarding it with a disdainful flick of the wrist. Flopping it back on your side of the table with an upturned nose.... Disgusting thing....

[Ablazoned 126]

2 hours ago, underling said:

During the End Phase, the player with initiative has the option to pass the initiative to the opposing player. Note that the player may also keep it. We felt that handling it this way introduced a little more strategy than simply passing it back and forth.

BUY BUY BUY UP UP UP I want it in the rulebook!

[Varyag 170]

House rules are fine, but the current rules do not need changing. If anything, I would bring back draws.

[Marinealver 7,757]

1 hour ago, Varyag said:

House rules are fine, but the current rules do not need changing. If anything, I would bring back draws.

modified wins making a comeback?

[gadwag 549]

Posted this in another thread, but I reckon moving all pre-activation actions (particularly repositioning) to the system phase makes things a lot fairer, because you can actually block ships.

[ForceSensitive 1,288]

I've been saying this for awhile now. I didn't used to believe it but for some reason things are different enough now that I do. Haven't quite got a finger on what yet but still analyzing.

Would have been the difference of first and forth in at least one tourney this season for me. Which was super aggravating as at the time call, I clearly had won with 4Xrebels taking out Whisper/Vader, Soontir, and halving two punishers keeping Wedge and just barely Blount at half. Sadly Wedge needed one hit to seal the deal in the final round and needing to Barrel roll out of range of Redline in the final maneuver meant no focus, and blank+snake eyes doesn't do it 😒

[LordBlades 2,403]

On 12/17/2018 at 4:58 PM, BCooper85 said:

I thought the point of this game was to have fun, my apologies.

Winning is also fun. 

 

If you had a choice between making a fun decision and making an unfun, but game-winning decision, the threshold at which one becomes the preferred option over the other it's different from person to person. You can't rely on that to 'police' how the game is being played. 

[Magnus Grendel 7,740]

20 hours ago, dotswarlock said:

- Design wise: I feel like FFG made a solid effort of having I5 and I6 squads / pilots that are really good.  I3 and I4 could use a bit more love.  Hopefully the 2 new factions will fill that design space.

Well, I can't see the CIS having many (if any) I5 and I6 pilots, given that the bulk of their 'aces' are multi-limited droids and asajj (one of the only pilots from clone wars we see really mix it up successfully with the jedi) is only I4 as a scum pilot.

[thespaceinvader 15,392]

20 hours ago, dotswarlock said:

- Design wise: I feel like FFG made a solid effort of having I5 and I6 squads / pilots that are really good.  I3 and I4 could use a bit more love.  Hopefully the 2 new factions will fill that design space.

 

This is actually one of the biggest problems with the design of the game.  It was identified in 1e and only sporadically fixed, and hasn't really been touched in 2e - that the highest init pilots should NOT have the best abilities.

Good abilities should go with LOW PS, so that you have a choice between arc dodging and perfect information, OR good abilities.  Pilots where everything's concentrated on the top pilot are super difficult to balance because they're so all or nothing.

If, for instance, boba had say, koshka's ability, and vice versa, you'd have a solid listbuilding choice between lower init and double mods, or higher init and a less useful power.

With it the way it is there's almost no incentive to ever use a lot of low-init pilots, because their abilities are terrible too.

[Magnus Grendel 7,740]

20 minutes ago, thespaceinvader said:

This is actually one of the biggest problems with the design of the game.  It was identified in 1e and only sporadically fixed, and hasn't really been touched in 2e - that the highest init pilots should NOT have the best abilities.

Good abilities should go with LOW PS, so that you have a choice between arc dodging and perfect information, OR good abilities.  Pilots where everything's concentrated on the top pilot are super difficult to balance because they're so all or nothing.

There are a few cases of this* but it's admittedly not as prevalent as it should be. The game can heft up the price of super-aces, too, but we'll have to see if they actually do that.

 

* Off the top of my head:

• Duchess springs to mind - she's cheaper despite being higher initiative because that's basically all she has going for her compared to her peers
• Some of the lower initiative TIE/fo fighters have great abilities - Scorch, for example, is arguably better than "Midnight" now juke doesn't work anymore (as is "null" but that's kind of a special case since his ability is improved initiative)
• Arguably Snap, Nien and Ello's abilities are as good as Poe's totally-not-push-the-limit honest, and frankly any of them can fly Black One to great effect if you're not dead-set on I6

[thespaceinvader 15,392]

Duchess is about the onyl good example left.  Guri used to be, but now she's the top init pilot as well.

[Hiemfire 2,252]

5 hours ago, Magnus Grendel said:

Well, I can't see the CIS having many (if any) I5 and I6 pilots, given that the bulk of their 'aces' are multi-limited droids and asajj (one of the only pilots from clone wars we see really mix it up successfully with the jedi) is only I4 as a scum pilot.

Still waiting on the stats for the Tri-Fighters. If there is going to be an I6 droid it'd be one of them, or a Magna Guard piloted Rogue. Maybe both.  

[Cuz05 675]

Does every faction need an I6?

Every squad doesn't.

I'm sort of interested in CIS. We have a Sith Infiltrator, I rather fancy it with Jango.... and I like Tri Fighters rather a lot. I'm not feeling much theme around an I6, it sort of puts me off there being one. Just personal taste, I don't tend to use them.

CIS. The anti-bid faction. I'm in