Who is the most Broken

[Pauly_D]

As for ISA, after many, many games both as and against them of late I think the step from dodge 5+ to 3+ was too much, 4+ would be fairer I feel, White Stars used correctly are horrendous to hit
I've used and had used against me battle level ships on CAF barely scratching a ship of lower priority level
3+ saves are amazing, that's why there's so many space marine players out there!

yeah i always felt that it should have been 4+ but got an extra AD on the beam, coz in the show they did a lot of damage but did also take a lot of hits
but the White Star 2 tho, a Battle level ship with 3+ Dodge, WOW, that is something to run from, ok admittedly its only got Crew 12 but you still have to hit it first

 

[emperorpenguin]

the 1AD can seem a little low (especially with my rolling) but the addition of precise to the pulsars has really boosted their firepower

 

[lastbesthope]

the 1AD can seem a little low (especially with my rolling) but the addition of precise to the pulsars has really boosted their firepower

And the AF trait on the Pulsars sure helps, especially when you pair them up against fighter heavy fleets.

LBH

 

[emperorpenguin]

the 1AD can seem a little low (especially with my rolling) but the addition of precise to the pulsars has really boosted their firepower

And the AF trait on the Pulsars sure helps, especially when you pair them up against fighter heavy fleets.

LBH

oddly enough we never leave fighters in the front arcs of white stars anymore.... :wink:

 

[lastbesthope]

oddly enough we never leave fighters in the front arcs of white stars anymore.... :wink:

Not many did before, but especially if you have a pair of WS working together, facing each other to cover their rear and side arcs, no fighters will come near you.

LBH

 

[Eisnhorn141]

I haven't had a chance to play with either of them yet but the Shadows and Vorlons really seemed nuetered in this version. While I thought they were slightly overpowered(mostly in the damage dept.) in the original version, this went to the other extreme. Th Vorlons seem really vulnerable with only forward firing weapons. The Shadows biggest problem is a lack of ship choices. I would suggest when the Drakh are put into service, to use them in a manner similar to the League with ISA(ie. use them to augment the Shadows). It would give the Shadows a little more to play with. Overall I' pretty pleased with the general play of things.
JT :twisted:

 

[B5freak]

tamcoan,

yeah, Abbai all the way. And as for white stars and a 3+ dodge, just run one up close to an Abbai fleet. Talk about the "death of 1,000 cuts". Drazi ain't got nothing on Abbai.

 

[emperorpenguin]

tamcoan,

yeah, Abbai all the way. And as for white stars and a 3+ dodge, just run one up close to an Abbai fleet. Talk about the "death of 1,000 cuts". Drazi ain't got nothing on Abbai.

but even a bimith will only do one point of damage statistically to a white star, so i hope you've a lot of ships to spare!

 

[lastbesthope]

Statistically a Bimith will score 2 hits on a White Star, the average damage will likely be more than one, factoring in the slight possibility of crits, but you should at least score '1 and 1'.

LBH
Sorry EP, I had to run the numbers, I do it without thinking. Your analysis was also right.

LBH

 

[emperorpenguin]

Statistically a Bimith will score 2 hits on a White Star, the average damage will likely be more than one, factoring in the slight possibility of crits, but you should at least score '1 and 1'.

LBH
Sorry EP, I had to run the numbers, I do it without thinking. Your analysis was also right.

LBH

I'm still vague on whether a result of 3 damage on adaptive armour rounds up to 2 or down to 1 :?

16 shots hitting on 5 = 5.33 (so 5) with 11 re-rolls = another 3.66 (so 4) meaning a total of 9 hits
a white star should dodge 6 leaving 3 hits which should most often result in 3 damage but halved.

 

[lastbesthope]

I'm still vague on whether a result of 3 damage on adaptive armour rounds up to 2 or down to 1 :?

Down, says so in Revised ACTA Book 1. but was ruled on for the Feb tourney way back.

16 shots hitting on 5 = 5.33 (so 5) with 11 re-rolls = another 3.66 (so 4) meaning a total of 9 hits
a white star should dodge 6 leaving 3 hits which should most often result in 3 damage but halved.

My bad, I used the first arc with 12 AD.

Ok, 16 AD, Tewin linked against a 5 hull gives 5.33, and then another 3.5555555.... on the rerolls. Giving a total of 8 and 8/9 hits on average, call it 9.

Or if we say 5 hits with 11 rerolls you get 8 or 9 hits in total. call it 9 on average.

The White Star dodges 4 out of every 6 hits so that leaves 3 hits. [EDIT I had this at 2 hits, my bad I was remembering the Nial doidge score]

I have just run a spreadsheet to figure out the average damage dealt per hit, with no traits affecting the damage rolls (which is correct for the Bimith. allowing for the possibility of scoring a crit, and assuming 1d6 averages at 3.5 for the location 6 crits that require it, the average Damage caused per hit is 1.01 and the average Crew loss is 1.18 (Both roundded to 2 d.p.)

I have kept the sheet as it may be useful for further analysis later.

So on average, after halving for Adaptive Armour, a Bimith could at most, do 2 and 2 to a WS, if it was in the more powerful arc. But the average lies somehwere between scoring 1 and 1, and 2 and 2 after halving.

LBH

 

[Maksim-Smelchak]

Hi Guys,

I haven't played the Minbari yet, BUT...

I know that the Shadows are really broken...

They're seriously underpowered. They need turretted weapons and slightly better speed for starters.

Shalom,
Maksim-Smelchak.

 

[emperorpenguin]

Well after the tournament and its large number of Minbari and ISA players I';m still saying those fleets are broken...

There was one Vorlon fleet and I felt really sorry for the guy, they were very poor, something needs fixing

 

[Pauly_D]

ok here is my rundown on how balanced i think the fleets are

Earth-most ships need slightly more damage as more people are using ships with beam weapons which totally ignore interceptors, this is why EA do so badly against Minbari because almost all minbari weapons are Beam or Mini-Beam
Earth ship in most need of change: Oracle, needs to brought down to Skirmish level

Minbari-clearly overpowered, Stealth, lots of Double-Damage+Precise+Beam+Super AP Weapons, way too maneoverable, and there damage and crew levels are about the same as races without stealth, saturdays tourney really showed how powerful they are
Minbari ship in most need of change: Veshatan, how much damage does that ship have, AND its got stealth backing it up, easily the most powerful ship at Battle level

Centauri-definately balanced, their attack is their defense and skirmish level ships are extremely manoeuverable
Centauri ship in most need of change: Demos, it has too little Damage/Crew for a Hull 5 raid level ship, it cant last long enough to get into range but weapons are powerful but it does need a little more survivability

Narns-Also balanced and i was really surprised that no-one took Narns in the tournament (too busy taking Minbo's i expect) but they have enough damage to get in close and give out a lot of damage back, their disadvatage is Boresights but thats the same for EA as well

ISA-obviously that dodge is too high, and apart from LBH's bad sportsmanship all other ISA players scored very well in the Tournament (even LBH could beat the reigning champions Minbari so they must be too powerful)
ISA ship in most need of change-White Star, more the dodge than the ship but it probably would be better to drop the dodge down to 4+ and give it an extra Beam dice, and do a similar change to the White Star 2

Shadows and Vorlons-well need i say more, too weak at low levels, i know they were designed that way but its too hard for them to do anything

League-mostly balanced, using mixed league can generally make up for individual league weaknesses
League Race in most need of change-Abbai, they need a good reason to use them

 

[Target]

Shadows and Vorlons definately need fixed.
Earth needs more hits and Oracle needs to be skirmish.
Not so sure on toning the mimbari down but only been playing them at raid level.
If Mimbari need toned down then Centauri might need it as well, it's probably the amount of beam each has so increased hits on EA might fix this.
Haven't fought ISA under SFOS so can't comment.
I haven't actually fought Narn yet but im getting closer to their systems ( Plaing a campaign currently stuck between EA and Mimbari ) but they seem balanced.

 

[lastbesthope]

After discussion with Matthrew and ALex, their feeling is the ISA and Minbari are broken for tournament play more than they are for campaign play. at the lower PLs, both the ISA and the Minbari suffer from lack of ship choice, or high vcost of their big guns.

I mean, can you imagina an ISA/Minbari fleet at 5 point Skirmish, or Patrol. not such an overawing fleet now is it.

They are considering possible changes to the tourney rules to try and encourage wider fleet choice. PL changes are only one of the changes under consideration. I'll keep the rest hushed for now, so as not to jump the gun too much. If I already have, let me know Mongoose and I'll edit my post.

LBH

 

[Maksim-Smelchak]

Hi LBH,

Pauly_D: ...and apart from LBH's bad sportsmanship...

*** What's this about (bad sportsmanship), LBH? ***

------

After discussion with Matthrew and ALex, their feeling is the ISA and Minbari are broken for tournament play more than they are for campaign play. at the lower PLs, both the ISA and the Minbari suffer from lack of ship choice, or high vcost of their big guns.
I mean, can you imagine an ISA/Minbari fleet at 5 point Skirmish, or Patrol. not such an overawing fleet now is it.
They are considering possible changes to the tourney rules to try and encourage wider fleet choice. PL changes are only one of the changes under consideration. I'll keep the rest hushed for now, so as not to jump the gun too much. If I already have, let me know Mongoose and I'll edit my post.
LBH.

Thanks for the update, LBH!

I hope they do justice to Shadows with turreted weapons.

Shalom,
Maksim-Smelchak.

 

[Wulf Corbett]

I hope they do justice to Shadows with turreted weapons.

I could accept if they gave the T arc to the Scout, and took it away from the Ship, to better reflect their purpose and what's seen on the show.

Although personally I'd prefer if they'd just leave the bloody thing alone for at least a couple of years.

Wulf

 

[lastbesthope]

Hi LBH,

Pauly_D: ...and apart from LBH's bad sportsmanship...

*** What's this about (bad sportsmanship), LBH? ***

------

I only got 15 out of 40, noone should really get less than 20. I know who gave me 0, and why, and I bear him no ill will. But there are other aspects of my behaviour that are also not up to snuff, I am just glad this happened to bring them into sharp relief for me. Noone is more embarassed by this than me

Did I play against you MS?

LBH

 

[emperorpenguin]

Earth-most ships need slightly more damage as more people are using ships with beam weapons which totally ignore interceptors, this is why EA do so badly against Minbari because almost all minbari weapons are Beam or Mini-Beam
Earth ship in most need of change: Oracle, needs to brought down to Skirmish level

I agree with this, EA ships have always been big, tough armoured boxes with engines and guns attached.

Minbari-clearly overpowered, Stealth, lots of Double-Damage+Precise+Beam+Super AP Weapons, way too maneoverable, and there damage and crew levels are about the same as races without stealth, saturdays tourney really showed how powerful they are
Minbari ship in most need of change: Veshatan, how much damage does that ship have, AND its got stealth backing it up, easily the most powerful ship at Battle level

Absolutely over the top fleet at present. I'm not happy with this "variant PL for tourney" idea I've heard. Although I wasn't there to hear the specifics I feel that the fleet needs changes not a covering exercise to paper the cracks, though I can understand this soon after SFOS their reluctance to do so. However for a second edition the basic rule that needs to be understood is that ships with stealth should have less damage. The immense firepower of these things is bad enough, the Tigara for example is sick

Centauri-definately balanced, their attack is their defense and skirmish level ships are extremely manoeuverable
Centauri ship in most need of change: Demos, it has too little Damage/Crew for a Hull 5 raid level ship, it cant last long enough to get into range but weapons are powerful but it does need a little more survivability

I'm in agreement that the Narn and Centauri are the most balanced fleets. I'm not sure why there are those who rate the Centauri as cheese. I think if the EA had better damage scores on their ships it might solve things. Centauri are well armed but fragile. As for the Demos, I agree again. I kicked up a stink to get that ship into SFOS (Matt admitted back in Feb he'd forgotten about it!) but with the jump in PL of so many Centauri ships it's been left behind. At hull 5 and 18 damage it's just not viable for such a short range ship. It needs interceptors (which we saw used in season 5) and perhaps hull 6 or a few extra damage

Narns-Also balanced and i was really surprised that no-one took Narns in the tournament (too busy taking Minbo's i expect) but they have enough damage to get in close and give out a lot of damage back, their disadvatage is Boresights but thats the same for EA as well

I've been really impressed by these guys in SFOS. The G'Quan could use an extra AD on its beams and so on but a well rounded fleet. Any clash between them and the Centauri is a close call

ISA-obviously that dodge is too high, and apart from LBH's bad sportsmanship all other ISA players scored very well in the Tournament (even LBH could beat the reigning champions Minbari so they must be too powerful)
ISA ship in most need of change-White Star, more the dodge than the ship but it probably would be better to drop the dodge down to 4+ and give it an extra Beam dice, and do a similar change to the White Star 2

3+ dodge is too good. For a raid level ship it requires a disproportionate amount of fire to eliminate. I'd probably trade an extra AD on the laser for the reduced dodge of 4+

Shadows and Vorlons-well need i say more, too weak at low levels, i know they were designed that way but its too hard for them to do anything

Having fought the only Vorlon player at the torney and destroyed his fleet with an hour left to play I know that the d6 damage thing kills these guys. Whereas a 1 is usually a disappointment when firing at other ships it's good here. My weaponry tore his ships apart and I wasn't impressed by the firepower of vorlon destroyers at all.
Not one of his 9 flights of fighters got to fire on my ships either, shot down by twin arrays or jumped on by my sentris

League-mostly balanced, using mixed league can generally make up for individual league weaknesses
League Race in most need of change-Abbai, they need a good reason to use them

Maybe the Abbai could use shields capable of deflecting beams?