I won't worry about balance between figures but more about balance between "tier 1" squads. The game is filled with figures not being balance with each other. Also I would say Flobi is a different beast than GOWK, similair but much different.



Everyone getting hit 20% more often is big, really big for already high defense figures. Flobi also needs Mas as his CE is range 6 so he cost closer to 19 more points. Flobi is less versatile than GOWK in term of squad building so it may be easier to prepare for Flobi squads. (Warning math: Say attacks hit 50% before CE, 6 attack means average of 3 hits, 4 attack at +20% means 2.8 hits not a big difference)



Fly and surprise move in far from an other R2, I wouldn't compare the two. The range(6 vs 12 movement) is different, the timing is different, no override etc. It could get ignoring but every use of surprise move makes him easier to kill and his offense is at worse 40 damage. The only figure I not looking forward to see pair to Flobi is rex and maybe the twileks and that's it. GMA are still a restricted ability for the republic and they don't have activation control to make the opportunist unbearable.

Not saying he won't be good or even find a tier 1 squad to call home but I just can't see flobi being a broken problem. Now about GOWK(which need to come off ban, He in the start set man) ...take away mastery and make it plain Soresu Style thoughts?

I'm not too worried about Flobi.

Most of GOWK's problem was his CE, because he boosted his support to such extreme levels of survivability. You either had to focus on GOWK, or you had to focus on his support...whichever one you didn't go after was the one that killed you. But now Flobi has a weaker CE and costs more, and those are two factors which add up to the fact that his support will not be nearly as much of a problem as GOWK's support was. Right now it looks like Rex is the best support that Flobi can bring (because the TBSVs require opportunist to be truly effective), and Rex is pretty much defenseless once you get close to him; he also needs good dice to hit the worthwhile targets. Cad Bane would be good, but his higher cost combined with Flobi's cost makes for a very limited squad. (However, in 300pt + games, I'm looking forward to using Flobi, General Skywalker, and Capt Rex with some crazy clone goodness, because Flobi will contribute so much to the rest of the squad.)

The question of SSM and Mettle being overpowered is a good one. His initial SSM saves will be extremely important because he has a limited pool of FP. In fact, I expect that in many matches, Flobi's initial SSM saves will single-handedly determine whether or not he was worth his points. I don't know about the rest of the players, but I personally don't like to choose a piece based on the gamble of good dice. If dice make or break a mini's effectiveness, then I'll usually avoid it in competitive play. Limiting Flobi's force points is big. Sure, let him fprr with Mettle...he can only do it 5 times (assuming no Surprise Move or rerolled attacks), and then he's in trouble. In fact, on this mini, I wouldn't even be too concerned if he had MotF2, because he could only benefit from it twice in a game.

So in the final analysis, I do think that there is a place in SWM for SSM (as is), as long as it is not on a piece that dominates the meta as GOWK did. And GOWK dominated the meta for a bunch of reasons, not simply because of his SSM/MOTF2/MEttle combo. His low cost and his crazy support were key...Flobi won't pose a problem in that regard.

Captain Rex, Clone with Repeating Cannon, Flobi, R2, Mouse x3, Ug x3 ... go!

10 activations, 11 shots per round. And then you still have to deal with Flobi, who will have no reason to hang back. R2 can tow him 12, then he can move 12, then 6 more on the next round if you win init. Yeah, some people will say "no accurate" but that won't protect you for very long.

At 200, it's even worse.

that squad is dreadfully weak with its survivabilty. If GOWK ended up running around on his own when he had figures with evade and +4 d how long do you think it will be before it becomes flobi v the world?

I'm not saying it won't be tough or a good squad but its not going to break anything at the top level.

I realize with 4-6 force, GOWK is still amazing. I'm not saying to only take away force renewal, but if you take away renewal, you also limit "Master of the Force 2," & "Mettle."

I agree with ThereisnoTry in the sense that his Commander Effect is too powerful. If GOWK only had 4 force and a greatly reduced CE, he would be significantly easier to kill as would his squad. He would be competitive, and so would FlObi (sinse nothing is changing with SSM). However, GOWK probably won't be breaking meta. He would just be a solid piece.

So I think you could get a triple wammi on GOWK (renewal and MOTF2 and Mettle are all limited by the limitation of his force points) if you limited his force points enough. That means all we would need to adjust on GOWK is his force renewal and CE, which would make it eaasier to keep track of.

Which will be (a) horrifically out activated and (b) incapable of hitting anything with a decent defense.

And god help you should you run into yobuck. You have two pieces that survive the initial onslaught. (Assuming normal attack is aimed at R2).

Explain how that even stands a chance versus normal IG swarm, even in 150? (assuming you replace Grievous with Whorm)?

Or Speeder? (Outactivate, base Rex with speeder, shoot rex 4x with Leia, maybe have Han pick off the repeater, and then just start firing non stop at Flobi, who is doing his whopping 40 damage a round).

I'm not sure the new Obi even makes Tier 1 in 150.

Well, honestly, that's a MUCH more complicated change to the card than simply removing Mettle and MOTF2, which seems to be the going suggestion that is the simplest. You're suggesting to remove MOTF2, remove Renewal 1, change his starting FPs, AND change the CE as well.

Honestly, I think I'm OK with simply leaving GOWK out of the picture. As many people have pointed out, his CE is part of what makes him so dangerous. Perhaps adjusting FPs/Mettle/MOTF2 AND tweaking his CE (perhaps +2/+2 or +3/+3 instead of +4/+4?) might be a way to go. I would just be worried that if you changed his CE too much, that there would be little or no difference between GOWK and Flobi. I really like the difference in flavor between the two options right now. So, if we can just simply tweak GOWK a little to make him less powerful, but not change the overall feel of the character, then it will allow the Republic faction to have two variations of Obi-Wan that have different uses, and slightly different feels to the squads you build with them.

Sorry, I was not saying we should remove Master of the Force 2. I was saying that MOTF2 would be limited itself if you just changed renewal on GOWK to 4 standard force points. I looked back at my post and I can see how what I was saying was confusing.

When I was thinking of changing his CE effect, I was not thinking of anything dramatic. I was thinking of something like just reducing the effect to +2/+2.

I am good with just simply taking away Mettle and Master of the Force 2, if that is the general desire among SWMgamers. It seems like it would help balance him a little more although I think he will still be one solid mini in the meta, but probably not broken or abused quite the way he was.

What about leaving GoWK as he is and just limiting his CE to simply affect Order 66 characters?

I have not run many scenarios, but affecting just clones means that the CE it is likely to break quite due to character positioning dependencies. Yes, he is still a tank to deal with, but suddenly squad creation seems to be reduced greatly and C Gree is another 20 poins there... and not all characters in the squad will benefit from his GOWK CEs is you go the fringe route...

Well that would make clones better, and make the CE less broken, but there are some very nice O66's cats out there to use.

The reality is, this is WotC's problem to solve, and until they are ready to do all the speculation in the world is just that - speculation.

I'll speculate that his CE should be this:

Non-unique allies with a printed attack rating of 10 or less.... (the rest as before)

I would support the GOWK Order 66 CE change, and believe that is all that's needed to bring him down to size.

Well, how likely is WoTC to fix GOWK? Is there any way pressure can be applied to get the figure changed and unbanned? Shame on them for making such a **** up, any idea if the new Lead Designer is interested on standing up to the challenge?

Honestly? I'd say read your insert for the definition of Soresu Style Mastery. There is a very subtle jab at those of us who have been pushing for them to fix it. And let's not forget, we lost both of the biggest WotC advocates for the game this year. That should put things in perspective.

I noticed that myself while reading it. I think this game is a cash cow for them that they just figure will just continue to make money for them no matter what happens to the player base. heck Heroclixs kept going even though from my experince it was a revolving door of players, even more so then SWM is.

Double quote, yay!
Although I am not a competitive player, I am quite familiar with the whole GOWK debacle and what WOTC has not been able/willing to do to fix it. There was a bit of sarcams in my comment...
This game is quite interesting: a medium size slice of milking cow strategy (I work in an industry where this things are mostly taken as "natural" by certain companies); a curious case of PR and Customer Care behavior where they are very approacheable people and good professionals towards the community, but for some internal/external factor don't proactively fix issues unless hard-pressed (IE erratas case)... and given that we have new guys on the Lead now, is there anything we can do to expose the issues as a community? I am sure there are a few initiatives out there, but dunno, I am reluctant to believe that there is no way we can influence WoTC!

In order to actually influence them, you have to have their attention. It took 4 years and a major debacle to get Sarah's attention. The people that had her attention - not to mention a direct line of contact with her on a monthly if not weekly basis - have never heard a peep from Greg Yahn or Peter Lee. Maybe in 4 years they might feel compelled to talk to one of us...

Yeah, having someone´s attention is pretty much an obvious pre-requisite for the intentional purposes of a bi-lateral communication, but taking into account that there is a big change of the powers-that-be (are) for this game, I see no reason why we shouldn´t ask the question for a fix repeatedly in both the Q&A sessions and the WoTC forums. The first is a given in the Q&A with Peter, the second has already been done to no avail, but what should keep us away from insisting? No consensus in the Community regarding possible fixes? Well that is pretty much up to the Lead Designer to decide -in fact, it is his job and you are basically pointing out to this-. The issue is there and exposed -the miniature is banned from DCI (the very first one!) and makes sometimes a problem in casual environment-. FlOBi, while being more balanced, is not the same mini and should not be considered a replacement.

Just a note to say the wording there was almost certainly not intended as a jab, subtle or otherwise, at anybody. It's simply the standard language used to indicate that it's intentionaly different from what appeared in a previous official source that will get updated in the future. I've used very similar wording myself in the various mini-FAQs and it has a history of use going all the way back to the early FAQ in the RS/CS era.