should be good enough to land you a solid 9th place

+1

Excellent thread TJ (especially the well thought out and detailed initial post).

It's funny how perception of something effects a meta more than the actual thing
often does.

For example - many people are saying that scissor squads can't be run, that they
can't compete with the rest of the meta. This is far from the truth. Last year I
made it to the final match with a single lancer build, and really lost more due
to being outplayed than matchup. The lancer is overly powerful and is a major
NPE to most. It needed to be slowed down a bit. Then a bunch of high hp/high
attack strafers and gallopers with additional tricks up their sleeves all got
dumped into the game at once. We would have a meta full of scissor insanity if
some counters hadn't been added. But there is an incorrect perception that those counters make scissor squads unplayable. They cannot be run due to LINs or Buzz Droids. But in reality, these only give
certain squads a fighting chance, and only slows scissors down a little when
played by a good scissor player. It's not all that different from a Kel-dor or
a Jedi with riposte. It's usually just a roadblock to fly around. Now with the
high HP strafers and gallopers, they can often just take the damage and go
right THROUGH it. I'd often laugh when I played a lancer squad and someone
thinks they would win just by having a keldor in the squad. Then I'd fly around
it and decimate their squad.

Perhaps that is part of it. There are not a lot of people who feel like they can
confidently run a scissor squad successfully. I hear all the time "I just can't
run a lancer" or "I just can't run Yodabuck".

Even with new counters available, scissor squads are more viable than ever. Vs
the whole meta, not just vs paper. Trevor beat a talented group of players in
the Vassal Regional with Yodabuck. Including players who had Lobot and other
options to bring in LINs or other counters. We chatted about it during our game.
He described how easy it would be for his squad to dispose of a LIN. It's almost
laughable how easy it is.

But I really think that it's the false perception that scissor squads are not viable in
the meta overall has helped shape this meta more than anything else.

And now that people's eyes are starting to be opened up to a few things (Daala
is not nearly as successful in the US, scissor squads are still viable as top
tier squads, if not more so), the meta will change somewhat drastically. Not only will we see a surge in scissor squads, but we will certainly see some rock squads too (trying to stay one step ahead of the scissors), and then suddenly we have a wide open meta again.


I think a big part of what makes an NPE is the feeling that you can't do anything about it. A squad decimates you and you barely even got to attack. It feels like an auto-win vs your favorite type of squads to play.

Well - nearly everyone is biased, and whatever hurts what THEY want to play makes them mad. I can't tell you how many times I have heard, "I can't play my Jedi because of Daala." (Ironic statement since Yodabuck and General Skywalker are Jedi last time I checked).

I'm not above this, I just was not bothered so much since what I generally play can beat Daala. I just kept scratching my head thinking - it seems simple enough to beat her, what's the issue? I had to step back and remember that it's hard to run scissor squads well, and a few new counters makes people think that scissors are completely neutered.



Above all - I agree with TJ. Let Daala have her shot. She's very good - but not broken. Broken is when a piece creates a squad that can beat every other top tier squad. This is far from the truth.

I think there are also some existing Daala counters that people haven't seen in tournaments yet. For example, I wasn't able to attend any regionals this year due to scheduling issues, but I would have loved to have gone against Daala with my Cloaked Figures squad. With the new changes in gambit in place, the squad gets even better since you can cloak Kenobi, carry him into gambit with Foul and then sit there as the troopers kill themselves as they run adjacent to Kenobi. If they ignore kenobi and the rest of the peices in the squad, they just kill them at range with force grip. An earlier version of my squad got a 3pt win against a Rebel swarm of Tantive 4's (played by an excellent player) in the New Zealand Vassal Tournament that I played in this year, so it is very possible to win with it against swarms. Also, Yuuzhan Vong with Quednaks are also a solid option for taking out Daala squads (bring in a Quednak with Quoreal to get Aggressive Negotiations and then march the Quednak close enough to kill tons of troopers). So it's not just Yobuck and Lancers that are the "only" counters. I think there are still some excellent squads yet to be seen that can counter Daala.

I am very interested in the efficacy of the counters (LIN, Buzz Droid) against a good Lancer player.

I've just put it in the too hard basket (and I just don't play Lancer very much, and never in competitive games). Does it affect map choice?

I also think Grievous wheelbike with Tann, spotter and either a backup strafer like Durge (to follow up Grievous after he clears out those pesky buzz droids or more support can do well against Snowtroopers. I had a bit of success with a Battle Droid counter swarm against Snowtroopers as well. That game was a gong show of activations but as a swarm player, quite fun and battle-like.

I don't hate Daala as much as other players do, I simply don't use her and recommend newer players to try out the broken teams so they stand a chance against the older more skilled players and our in depth knowledge of the game. If I had to fix her though I would just release a new more balanced card with a barebones prideful and charging assault.