The noble will be best used as an untouchable door opener for cannon squads (Luke HoY, speeder or Han with Princess Leia).

Its one of the only 'modern' builds where your likely to expose a target and leave him there. For a round.

If you don't intend being static and visable with your figs they really arn't that great.

Exar and Thrawn may be able to use them to a certain extent but how often do you have a fig in LOS with thrawn?

If the Emperor were amoung the best melee pieces made, yes I think there would be people really angry at it. Hence my statement that if you want to play a luck squad, play gotals... D should have stayed on that piece so you had to devote an entire build around them. Let's say Revan has Betrayal (I would consider that very canon like since you can 'win' over different characters), and has VERY solid stats for his point cost... then we will talk about betrayal and how broken it is!

If you want to see how powerful betrayal is, play on the forests of Endor map with the rules in the treeline.

Well, the Medic flatly is better than the only previous incarnation we've seen. Dramatically so? no. However, it is better... 1 def and cheaper by 11% is significant. While I agree the Medical Droid is better in many circumstances, the Medic IS superior to the previous version (yes, Rebel vs Republic, I know).

And as for the Noble, I think it is pretty competitive. 5 point shooters rarely contribute much past combining fire, which admittedly is wonderful... but the noble brings a whole new purpose. I'm not screaming "this breaks the game!", but I am thinking that he fits into the category of "cheap guy I think you'll see in squads often".

So what if the medic is better than a figure that was only marginally used in the Rots days??? No one plays a Rep medic anymore. And it wasnt even ouclassed. I prob wont even play this one ever, but at least it has attack options unlike the previous. Lol, polis medic outclassed... You gotta have a better argument than that.

Adding another option to the cheap 5 pt fodder with some different options is a great addition to the game. It in no way invalidates other 5 pt figs. I honestly dont see his potential outside of a couple of uses. He will not be universally seen at all.

That's the thing about this debate. I can honestly say I dont see any powercreep in these new figures - not in the overall sense of the game. Sure, I can pick any two random figures and say, see this one is better than that one, but if its not playable to begin with, the argument is silly.

And to add to the Boba debate. Han Scoundrel with Princess Leia and Obi FS is significantly better than Boba in a majority of games. Both one on one, and in squads. The only reason Boba catches up competitively is because of the JWMs. Han can use the WFFs which keeps it even at 150. But at 200, the Rebel variant is significantly better.

Boba is not the best shooter in the game. Han Scoundrel is much much better if you give him his required support (even give Boba R2 to equal the cost).

Han does more dmg, survives longer, and most importantly. Will end games early with his 150dmg much more often than Boba. Even given all of the abilities that can negate his dmg. I have done plenty of tests to see the result.

There are two dedicated medics in the game. Why compare it to the bad one to make the point that it's better? If you're going to find bad figures to compare to, couldn't you make the same point about almost every character in every set? What 7 point melee isn't better than a Twi'lek Scoundrel? What 10 point shooter isn't better than a Mon Cal Merc?

You seem worried that the unseen stuff will be as good as what we've seen from the previews. I think that would be great. That means we'd have a set full of pieces that are priced pretty competetively while still allowing the good stuff from past sets to be competetive. I only see a problem (ie my definition of "powercreep") when all the good stuff from past sets is overshadowed by the average stuff from a new set. That means that entire sets will constantly become uncompetetive as new sets are released. Right now you could go out and buy a RS booster and something in that booster is likely to be good 7 sets down the road even if it's just a Stormie, Quarren, or Twi-lek Bodyguard.

We've never really seen that with SWM, and I have faith in Rob that he'll continue to build sets that way. Of course, they'll never be perfect. There will be pieces too good for their cost, and pieces too bad. There will be abiilties with unintended consequences on the competetive game. But overall, these items have been managed in SWM better than any other similar game and that's where keeping things in perspective is important.

<sigh> Fine fine... you're right... everything is fine... Rob is a genius... nothing will be obsolete that isn't already... hurray for FU...

Sorry, just tired of arguing... I'm clearly not going to convince you of anything... you made up your mind (in some cases, I think minds were made up long before FU previews)... and so we'll just wait and see. As you say, you have faith... perhaps I'll learn it someday... perhaps instead I'll have the horrible fate of getting to say "I told you so"... hopefully I'll be wrong and my fears will be unfounded... hopefully Rob IS a genius... hopefully...

Sorry, I didn't think the discussion was an argument. It seemed like something worth talking about.

And no one is saying Rob's a genius regardless of how this set turns out. It's just there's a pattern of doomsaying just prior to release with every set, and the last 6 times it's turned out do no significant harm to the game. Even the mistakes. (There is a tendency to dwell on the 1% of stuff that's problematic rather than the 99% that's better than anything else out there.) Until we can see everything, I prefer to give Rob the benefit of the doubt and to stay positive in general.

There it is again. Trivialization of the other side of the argument. *YOU* think that there has not been significant harm. I feel the reverse, I am not alone, but jeez is it pretty noisy in here with people saying that our claims are just 'doomsaying'.

I will make a prediction, based on historical data: The person who wins GenCon '08 will use a majority of points on newer pieces. Last year, it was B&B, pretty new... this past year, Boba BH, wicket and JWMs, also pretty new. I am almost sure enough to open this to all the players in the top 8.

Whatever, I am through with these discussions, as I said repeatedly, neither side will convince the other that they are right. Neither side will ever feel wrong. All that will happen is a bunch of defensive maneuvering and eventually lead to personal attacks.

[edit]BAD spelling error!

Eh....again...that's mostly marketing strategy. Honestly though, it's not like most of the top 8 at GenCon this year had squads that were that difficult to obtain. Only a couple of the top 8 had Boba BH. JWMs, Han Scoudrel, Obi-FS, Princess Leia, Wicket, San Hill....all super easy pieces to buy as singles, and all for pretty much less than $5-$7 apiece. Besides the fact that many of those squads still contained pieces from older sets: R2-Astromech, Weequay Leader, Twi-lek BGs, Quarren Assassins, Ewoks, etc. Heck, even the B&B army from GenCon '06...the only 'new' piece it had at the time was Mas Amedda! Everything else was from Universe or Rebel Storm!

Yes, there are always going to be new pieces that rise to the top. Honestly, if new sets don't contain pieces that shift the meta, then the game will die. It HAS to happen. Whether that happens by power-creep or not is really an individual opinion....



...and here's where I definitely agree with you. Like I said, a lot of it comes down to an individual opinion. What one person thinks is power creep, another person things is just a natural shift in the game. Heck, when Lord Vader came out in BH, most of us put JH back on the shelf. But once most of us started learning how to beat the JWMs, and A&E came along with some powerful force users....Here comes JH back again. He was never 'power-creeped' by Lord Vader. It was just that, for a time, JH's specific set of Special Abilities didn't seem to be the best choice.

It's just that some of us see that trend in past sets where pieces move in and out of the playable arena, and everything seems to point toward that continuing in the future. So far, I've not seen one single thing that makes me think "Oh my goodness, the game will never, ever be the same again." But, like you said, I guess it's just a personal preference.

I for one, am really looking forward to all the new Force Powers. I think it really mixes things up a bit, and should be a ton of fun!

And i love how the pro-power creep crowd never brings into play when old figures come back into play. San was never seen, but post B&B, he is now a top squad. Who used ECTs before Bacara? I think this argument is largely change vs no change crowds. Some of us like the change. Others don't like the change.

Not to mention the fact that you want to use the new pieces. Nobody wants a set that will be completely useless. Good players blend what was good from the old with what is good from the new.

This is one of the best games ever. Rob and company do a great job of keeping it that way.

Can someone please post a link to the list of the Gencon top 8 squads?

That's crazy! And thanks for the quick reply, but:

OW! You hit me right in the PET PEEVE!!! "Irregardless" = NOT A WORD!!!!

Irregradless - (adj.) to be without graduates of an atypical nature.

Holy crap, you guys are right. I'll try to remember what I can and post up a thread real quick in the 150 pt section. Boris, Bill, NickName, Dean, etc. ought to be able to fill any holes that I miss.

Actually though, I thought there was a thread over on the WotC forums with this same info at one point.

Main SWM page at wizards. Archive. Gencon 2007 Tournement Report from late August 2007.

Gencon 2007 included the largest SWM tourney to date with 90 players and 2-3 others that exceeded 30. Nearly everyone seemed to have a great time, including you. The French championship had 50 players. Even if you don't find the game perfect or even if you find it's gotten worse over time, the past doomsayers have clearly not been correct about any of the past sets killing the game and this summer was arguably a high point from a player's perspective.



A reasonable prediction. If there's a big Gencon tourney next year wouldn't that alone prove that the doom foretold about the death of the game in 2007 was incorrect?



Not from me.

Anyway, if it's not clear, from my perspective "doomsaying" = dead game. If you didn't say "set N is going to kill the game" then you aren't the doomsayer I'm talking about and your argument (about whatever different subject you're talking about) is in no way trivialized. (I didn't really have either you or Graeme in mind when regarding that comment.) If you did say that, then your argument is trivial, because the game is clearly not dead. And if you keep saying it about every set you will eventually be right because the game will end at some point.

Its this attitude that really irks me. I dont mind if people dont like figure X or whatever. It is the constant negativism and that everything new is going to bring the downfall of the game. If people feel that bad about every thing new, they do not belong not only in SWM, but any type of expandable game.

That, and you would think the nay-sayers would have learned something after the huge false hype behind the JWM. He wasn't nearly what everyone was panicking about.

Yeah, turns out the JWM is competitive melee... whoda thunk it?