I'm not sure there is a shadow affiliation in SWM. I know pretty much all the old heads and I'm always amazed at the wide variety of opinions between the people who have been around for ages.

However, There are trains of thought that are common place. If you challenge those views you can expect friction from a lot of places because many have been through these same arguments many times and have come out the other side with understanding and perhaps a reluctant acceptance for how things are.

I've stepped away from these boards for a few months but when I come back its the same conversations with perhaps different figures replacing old ones in the conversation as the game tries to balance on a knife edge of community ideas.

people are passionate about this game, still, after 14 years and like minds tend to band together but how much are people plotting behind the scenes?

I'd wager very few, if any.

For my own benefit, as someone who has been more of a semi-vocal almost-intelligent observer than a driving force, I'm curious about a few of the things you said - not asking for proof, just want to clarify my understanding of what you're saying.

Like "being open about things." Are you referring to saying things like what Timmer said about Krell being a mistake, and too far past designer intent? (i.e. owning up to a mistake, as opposed to downplaying it to save face)

And when you say "sides," I understand that to mean not just "These people are pro-Blast Bug, these others are anti-Blast Bug." but rather "these people are messaging each other privately, strategizing to undercut the opposition." Am I correct in this?

Lastly, (you said you would not respond with specific theories/proof, and I respect that, so I mean just in general), what does it look like to have a secret agenda for SWM? Are you referring to something like controlling what squads get boosted or nerfed, and what doesn't, so that your favorite squad is always on top? Or are you meaning simply controlling the game for sake of having control? (I'm just trying to wrap my brain around this - I'm really having trouble involving envisioning someone wanting to choke the life out of SWM, so I'm curious what exactly you mean by this).

Being open.

Yes, it is refreshing. It is about other things as well. Like being open to criticism, open to concerns, open to ideas. Not needing a top tier community member to say something for it to be taken seriously.

Sides.

I mean exactly that. People emailing people to make sure that they will be there to back them up if they say such and such. Or to ask people to say something about a certain piece or philosophy so that it can get the ball rolling and they will join in when the time is right.

Secret agenda.

This means that people have an affiliation with a certain group or "leader" and back them regardless of personal opinion.
These groups ensure that they have their people in design, pt, and balance committee.
They do try their best to make sure certain things are boosted and some things are nerfed. I mean mostly controlling the direction swm goes. Which philosophy will be followed, which rules will be made, which designs and special abilities are needed. Which play styles are ok, which are not.

All these things are needed and necessary and helpful. Just not in secret. Because what happens in a lot of cases is that one a person makes an affiliation they tend to "follow the code". Instead of using their own best judgement. Than you get two different ideas in design and it causes issues and the design process is never secret to the leaders. I have never had anyone spoil a design but I have had people say something like "we need to make sure that we restate how much people are against vehicles or swarms so that it helps my cause in not letting something be designed".

All this secret work just creates a feel of us vs them instead of this idea vs that idea. Which hampers what is actually right from coming to fruition.

Why in the hell would anyone want to limit the viability of various types of squads (heavy shooter,heavy melee, high activation, low activation, vehicles, etc). Doesnt that just mean there would be fewer options to play with? If that is the case then why in the hell would people be actively creating new Vsets in the first place? This site and the creation of customs/Vsets and those that want to limit the viability of the above can NOT coexist. If someone doesnt like vehicles, fine dont use them, dont like swarms, dont use them; I dont like Epic pieces, guess what..I wont use them. But I sure as hell would never try to prevent others from designing those pieces, and/or having them put into specific Vsets. I understand why some really like the Epic pieces and the types of games they involve, and it isnt My or ANYONE elses place to prevent those pieces from becoming official in Vsets (for their specific game format). I feel the same way for ANY other piece, whether it is a vehicle or some new named Jawa, OUR only concern should be to present it with the correct point value. (Thus if the piece is incredibly powerful or will become as such with a few allies, then its point value should go up considerably).

Sorry for the long post.

(there was a lot here I just decided to delete because of my "ultimate suggestion" below.)

You have the CCCs, which I have participated in and enjoyed. Ill create a piece and a lot of concern will come up because when you combine this piece with x,y,z, he is now doing 200 damage in a single turn etc. Thing is, that seems to be exactly what people are building their squads to do. I have seen a number of squads where the comments are "yep, character a,b,c is doing 120 a turn, character d,e,f are doing at least 80, and character g,h need to stay back as they will only do 20, but are providing most of the buffs" (this is highly paraphrasing, maybe even a bit exaggerated, but the idea is still there) Or the VERY recent discussion on reinforcements, a person created a reinforcement squad that gets 20+ points of reinforcements 50% of the time each round. That already exists. If that is too much for the community then, which character do you nerf? Do you nerf the ability(s) more? It comes to a point that there are so many options and combinations that you can make some REALLY cheesy powerful squads as it stands regardless of what new characters are created. It becomes in a lot of ways rock paper scissors between the most powerful squads types/builds. Those that go to tourneys are going to make those 200+ damage character combinations for their squads because those combinations exist and those persons want to win. he or she knows that is likely the type of squads he or she is going to face, whether it is a high or low activation squad or whatever.

The above conversation is in regards to tourneys, as those are what requires us to balance the game the most. Prizes, events at Gen Con etc force this requirement more than just 2 or more people playing a game for simple fun. But even those of us that play just for fun still want the point cost etc to be accurate for the piece. Think about it, you cost a piece more because of the synergies and combinations with other characters, well if you dont make those synergies and combinations then you have overpaid for that piece for your squad. You also have forced anyone that wants to use that piece to be forced to use that specific type of squad for said synergies because even though the character alone doesnt have them, you are forcing the player to pay for them. In other words, have the player pay for the ability of the character itself, not what might happen or could be combined with it. For that I have the suggestion below.


Ultimate suggestion, it is known what these combinations are, as well as synergies etc to make any piece very powerful I suggest a new "SA". "Name of ability": If this character is combined with "specific named character, or list of characters that are known to make this piece far far more powerful" this characters post cost is increased by X.
and for reconned increases "name of ability": If this character is in a squad with a character named "again specific character name for specific piece, could have a list of others as well" those characters point cost is increased by X.

In this way you pay for what you get. You dont over pay for something you didnt make in your squad, and you wont underpay for a very special combination of characters that are very powerful. Btw the above "name of ability" sa should cost 0 and not count as an SA for calculating if they have more than 5 SAs etc, the cost only comes in if it is triggered and the cost is X. X can and likely should change based upon the character and combinations. Again, these should be for the most part known, but what X should be is far more debatable, but would universally agree it shouldn't be 0.

Your comparing Apples and Oranges. Epics are not legal in tournaments. So if you don't want to play Epics... You just don't play the Epic format. Swarms and vehiles however, can be played in any format, because they are available in any format. And I think what your missing is, we don't play those types of squads, its playing AGAINST those types of squads. I'm all for swarms. I am not for swarms that have act control, and have 10 pieces who can do more than 60 damage, with a 19 attack. I don't find THAT fun to play against. Vehicles. The vehicles were so bad we had to direct counter them with the Lin Droids. The vehicles were so bad, those involved with them are ashamed, and have either disowned them, or have left designing. Why on earth they thought it was a good idea to give Seps another strafing attack is beyond my understanding. But its not fun. Just like the Ohio Regional. No one had fun playing against Ultimate reserves. With your definition, no one should of complained, because no one ran them. Just one guy. Yet, that one guy had such an impact on everyone else, that they felt compelled to immediately change the piece.

Swarms will ruin SWM. Mark my words. If they continue to get these obnoxious boosts, and continue to tear through 50 point pieces like paper, then why would you run anything that costs more than 30 points? Unless it was a Vital Commander you needed for your swarm? Swarms SHOULD be competitive, but not meta changing. Their attack should never get Un-Godly high. Their damage should NEVER be unpreventable. And if they ARE going to be like, you should not have more than 6 available in your squad.

I'm on board with a Floor rule that says " No more than X number of any non unique in a squad" so only X Mouse Droids. Only X Ugnaughts. Only X Stormtroopers, so on, and so on.

shmi15 [/quote] Your comparing Apples and Oranges. Epics are not legal in tournaments. So if you don't want to play Epics... You just don't play the Epic format. Swarms and vehiles however, can be played in any format, because they are available in any format. And I think what your missing is, we don't play those types of squads, its playing AGAINST those types of squads. I'm all for swarms. I am not for swarms that have act control, and have 10 pieces who can do more than 60 damage, with a 19 attack. I don't find THAT fun to play against. Vehicles. The vehicles were so bad we had to direct counter them with the Lin Droids. The vehicles were so bad, those involved with them are ashamed, and have either disowned them, or have left designing. Why on earth they thought it was a good idea to give Seps another strafing attack is beyond my understanding. But its not fun. Just like the Ohio Regional. No one had fun playing against Ultimate reserves. With your definition, no one should of complained, because no one ran them. Just one guy. Yet, that one guy had such an impact on everyone else, that they felt compelled to immediately change the piece.

Swarms will ruin SWM. Mark my words. If they continue to get these obnoxious boosts, and continue to tear through 50 point pieces like paper, then why would you run anything that costs more than 30 points? Unless it was a Vital Commander you needed for your swarm? Swarms SHOULD be competitive, but not meta changing. Their attack should never get Un-Godly high. Their damage should NEVER be unpreventable. And if they ARE going to be like, you should not have more than 6 available in your squad.

I'm on board with a Floor rule that says " No more than X number of any non unique in a squad" so only X Mouse Droids. Only X Ugnaughts. Only X Stormtroopers, so on, and so on.[/quote]


Big +1.

I agree with everything you said except for that I believe that Jason's reserve team should be modified. Kazden and Krell absolutely should never ever stack!

No im not, I know full well that Epics arnt reg tourney legal. My whole point was that no matter what the format, pieces should be useful.

If you (and anyone else reading this) gets nothing else from my posts is this: A player should only pay for what is on the card. NOT what that player might combine it with in some meta format. For this reason I suggested the above "reverse rapport" as ATM has said. I agree having 33 ewoks that can somehow do 30+ damage at +19 attack is cheese. However to get to that point the person better have paid 500 points for it. We know what these combinations are and what these combinations are in the future sets, so we have 2 new abilities that are "reverse Rapport" so that if a player wants to make such a squad he or she will have to pay for it. THAT balances out the equation. If they can get what you suggest for only 200 points vs what I can get for 200 points (that is no where near this level of damage potential) then yea there is no balance there. It will be difficult to afford said swarm that can do that if they dont have the points to pay for it.

This "reverse rapport" would need to be added to the appropriate pieces in the VSETS ONLY. VSETS are community created, and any very powerful squads based upon WOTC are a completely known commodity this many YEARS AFTER they were released. For this reason VSET pieces can be changed to add the two variants of this "reverse rapport" with specific (and should be at this time) well known named pieces that can cause issues when combined.

You suggest limiting the number of peices, how does that solve this issue? does that still mean i only pay 4,5 points for something that can still do 60 damage at +17 attack? that doesnt resolve the issue, unless the piece or pieces that give those stormtroopers etc that damage potential are considerably higher cost when paired with stormtroopers. Have we been under costing the CEs and SAs that boost other figures too much? That would seem to be incredibly true. Especially the number of SAs that in my opinion should be CEs, as SAs CANT be disrupted. The number of pieces should never be limited by some arbitrary rule, but instead be limited on how many points that can be spent.

Dont get me wrong some of these SAs make sense, but they should be limited to unique characters only to boost other specific unique characters only (like Ghost Crew members). If the ability affects more than just a hand ful of figures frankly it should be a CE.