Aaron, you are forgetting something (or maybe didn't know since you haven't been here from the beginning). WotC never intended SWM to be a competitive game.

It's IMO a big part of why there has been so much resistance to DCI involvement. The SW product line has always been the ugly step-child of WotC games, and will continue to be in all likelihood. Look at how they've treated the game this year, regionals and Championship aside.

And then look at how they have treated their other games and how those product lines are doing. In truth they are not doing much better than SWM but those lines are the bread-and-butter of not just the company but the industry.

If this is the end of SWM (and I'm not saying it is, but it's ignorant to recognize the collapse of similar products and think SWM is immune to that) I will still play the game when I can and still enjoy my stuff. Hell it will probably be better when I have house-ruled everything that is wrong with the game right now.

I have a question: why is Nickname being consulted in this? Isn't this Rob's call?

It could be something as simple as he's their communications focal, or they didn't want to drop the hammer while he was out of town, and have no one available to help deal with the communications aspect. Maybe they're asking him for the pulse of the SWM community regarding the issue.

There are lots of valid reasons, methinks.

Good points, and thanks for the reminder. I do realize that the Minis were only ever intended as a tie-in to the RPG to some degree. My guess is that LFL came to WOTC and said "Hey, you are taking over the RPG license, and we see you have a successful minis line that ties into the D&D RPG, so what do you think about giving Star Wars minis a shot?" And yeah, it's quite likely that they never expected to be anything more than a tie-in to the RPG. So I honestly won't be the least bit surprised to see SWM go the same way as DDM if that's what it comes down to. I will be sad, but not surprised.



Dean and I were discussing this last night a bit. Could be because NickName and Rob have discussed this issue before to some degree. Could be because NickName already has some knowledge about an upcoming piece/ability? Could be because NickName understands the rules interactions better than Rob sometimes? Not sure, could be any number of things, but I Dean was upset that whatever conference call or something that is supposed to happen was including both Jim and NickName, but not Dean, which seemed dumb since Dean is the DCI Rep now, and since this has a LOT to do with DCI, would make sense to have him involved.


BTW...whenever this 'announcement' is made, or the floor rules do go up, would one of you guys who has my phone number give me a ring? I'll be out of town next week, and probably not on the computer much, but I'd like to what happens and when.

Well, i know the reason why Iron is in on the up coming announcment,so that he can be perpared to handle any and all fall out without being cought off guard, while i have no proof on this other than my own speculation I think the choice about what to do has already been made,and they are just waiting for Nickname to get back so,that he can explain his decisons and all that.

The annoucnment itself atleast as far as my conversation with Sarah has to do with the GOWK threads.

[quote="LoboStele"]Grrr....absolutely nothing against NickName, but I know he doesn't feel as passionate about this as some of the rest of us, and he may not represent the 'ban him' community as well as I'd like. On the other hand, he is more in the 'middle of the road' on this whole debate, so he may be the best person for Sarah/Rob to converse with, since he doesn't seem to lean one way or the other..
quote]

From what I've read it seemed to me that for a second errata, Nickname was in favor of changing the SSM save to 16. I would agree with such a solution. The no FP SSM save alone would result in GOWK having what would correspond to approximately 160 HP. Still very tough but not completely unreasonable. The first FP spent to save against an attack would provide a 45% chance of negating an attack. Which is about the same probability afforded by lightsaber block and lightsaber deflect to other force users. That is, the FP spent for this purpose by GOWK won't be much more effective than an FP spent by another force user. The second FP will provide a 65% probability of negating an attack. Admittedly good, but still not completely out of bounds and close to the 70% another character with Mettle would get on a reroll.

The initial SSM save would fail 75% instead of 50% of the time. Which would correspond to a 50% increase in demand for first reroll FP's. The first reroll would fail 55% instead of 30% of the time. Which would correspond to an 80% increase in demand for second reroll FP's. The second reroll would fail 35% of the time instead of 10% of the time.

GOWK would burn FP's faster and still not get as much out of these points as today. He would not be nigh impossible to damage with an attack even if he has 2 FP's to spare. Well, if only one attack gets through GOWK would still have an 85% probability of negating it with 2 FP. However, with several attacks getting trough in the same turn GOWK would very soon be down to only the basic 25% SSM save.

Overall GOWK would still seem reasonably tough to handle with regular attacks. And he'd still be nearly immune to Grenades and other save based attacks if he has 2 FP's to spend. But he'd be easier to saturate with attacks in one turn to overcome his MOTF 2 and he'd completely run out of FP's sooner.

Also I'd prefer this solution to an errata which would changes SSM to work against adjacent attacks. As such a solution would leave GOWK as powerful as today for all melee units to deal with. And since they will be less able to avoid GOWK and go for his support than ranged units, melee units would need more help against GOWK than ranged units, not less.

In short, should NickName be able to promote a "SSM save 16" solution it would seem like a good thing to me at least.

Well, I for one was not here when this was going down in the beginning and think it is kinda interesting that someone on wizos asked about the Clone Stike Starter and its contents. Well I immediately thought about pointing them to the Archives, but also did a google search and found an old Chat from Clone Strike with Rob and Boris in it. Here- http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=st ... transcript

Basically I found this part interesting-



So, to me, it seems like Rob was always against DCI play and only agreed to it becuase of R2. I am sure this has only snowballed over time and GOWK is probably really getting his gourd. All conjecture on my part, but is sure seems consistent with the way he has stated things over the last couple of chats.

If they make it adjacent only, I'm going to smack someone. Haven't they completely hosed melee long enough in this game?

Besides that, I like the save 16. Although that makes Soresu style interesting.

This is actually the best logical reason I've seen so far in the idea of changing from Save 11 to Save 16. Making that 1st FP use similar to Lightsaber Defense, makes it as if they swapped SSM with LS Defense on the card, yet it still leaves GOWK will a little bit of possible defense against Vong or other Force Immune pieces.

Now, on the other hand though, that still doesn't address the possibility of SSM showing up on another piece down the road, and now that other piece is severely underpowered if it doesn't have the Mettle/MOTF2 combo as well, which would be a shame.

Of course....let's not let this thread turn into more "We should fix GOWK this way" sort of thread. There's plenty of those going around already. Let's try to keep this one more about the Floor Rules themselves, and whatever info people may have on this supposed "conference".

Couldn't Dean just give Sarah or one of them a call asking if the rules have been put up yet? I can't imagine they'd cut him out of the loop intentionally.

I don't think Dean has phone numbers. I know he had sent them emails though.

If they are just waiting for NickName to be around so he can field questions/etc, then I can understand.

Wow. I finally noticed this thread. Very interesting, and perhaps disturbing, events are taking place. The way thing are proceeding, it sounds like Wizos has something besides a ban in mid. Why else would they want to consult NickName first? As others have said, I can't help but feel NickName will be thrown under the bus regardless.

Man, this type of indecision and last second move makes me sick. Wizos has product gold in SWM and they don't seem to worried about this GOWK issue. I fear anything less than a ban may alienate a good portion of the top competitive players (Bill comes to mind). What a mess.

I guess this thread just highlights how much the community trusts WotC to handle matters. People are assuming the worst possible outcome.

I'm taking this in a positive way. I don't see how a simple ban would have needed NickName. This smells of errata, and if we get good errata that keeps GOWK in the game without being broken, isn't that even better than a ban?

The only downside will be that GenCon players will have less time to prepare, having to take into account GOWK 3.0 (it really would be version 3...). But hey, good players should know how to adapt quickly. I doubt it would affect who will be at the top tables.

The reason I was hoping for a ban was because I didn't expect an errata in any timely fashion. The prospect of good errata has me a lot more excited than a ban. Of course, should we end up with BAD errata... well, I'd hate to be in NickName's shoes...

I am not going to say much and have not said anything in thread. The floor rules will be up next week. I will also say that any speculation of more errata would be a waste of time. That is all I will say about this.

I assume, then, that means GOWK will be getting the ole boot from DCI.

I don't think it's safe to assume anything. Without errata on the table and the delay I'm back to worried that the issue is being put off for future pieces to balance.

well then you should have read my post more carefully..... very carefully a lot of info in those two lines

Ok then. . Reread in a more literal sense and it's more clear than I thought it was. I guess I was looking for a riddle.

Ok going back and keep on reading it that means he is still going to be banned but why would they need to talk to nickname?????? damn i hate riddles

Perhaps,Dean meant that GOWK will go back to melee only. The word 'more'when reffering to errata makes me consider less erratr