I would not like to start a new thread in order to find out why such a decision was made. But. CB has been making many strange and frustrating decisions lately, and this is far from the most important and painful of them. I see no reason not to answer the simple question - why there should not be this profile, is there any reason other than “just like that”. And if it is not, then why for the same reason it can not be there?
This thread doesn't seem necessary, let's keep Saito complaints to the main Saito thread (and I'm saying this as one of the loudest complainers.)
I do not think so. I am curious why such a decision was made. I am an active player and see no reason to make a secret of the decisions made for the game I play. I (and not only me) see the danger in being silent about the changes taking place if they do not make the game better.
As per the other thread, there's no secret decision - the Specialist Operative option was only intended to be available to Druze Bayram Security, but was mistakenly included in JSA in Army. I'm not a fan of that option being taken away after being available for so long, but the 'decision' is just clearing up a mistake.
The question is - WHY its only available on DBS, but not in JSA. Its make no sense, its not gamechanging.
On the controary it is if you remove Saito from list you get 41p free so you add 4x keisotsu and get 20 minatures list consist of Keisotsu spam .. now list is far worst and even more annoing , beside you need now 12 ~14 keisotsu models . If the idea for JSA is Heavy infantry list samurai armored spear - now after relice of invincible army this sectorial lack NCO and Liutenent L2 to even try at this list beside limited insercion. On most of cases Saito is a Gloryfied 41 p smoke provider ;) if it is Baccground Question - it is eazy - JSA do not trust Saito at enything other than throwing smoke undewr his feet - as this is hard to fuckup - he fail them one more time to much. On mechanic part - i think CB do not like a JSA spamlist they want ppl to use Shikami and probably Domary , Dayokai .. butthey forgetthat thay lack lets sey forvard deploy lvl 1 on shikami or smoke or 6-2 move or other way to actualy be usable.
Mechanically I suspect it is to boost Druze far more than it is to limit JSA. There just as many Specialist profile options in the Light Infantry Section of JSA as there are in the entire Druze army.
Druze isn't at all affected by what JSA does or doesn't have, and JSA isn't at all affected by options Druze does or doesn't have, at least mechanically. Thematically it hurts JSA a lot that another army would get more options for a unit than it does in its home army. Druze is also the smallest sectorial in the game and JSA is very average sized, so comparing that probably isn't a good standard. Locking the other thread was a cop-out though, I would like to see CB's rationale for this change. Not from a moderator, not from a playtester, but from someone who actually oversees list and balance changes.
It was also included in the Profiles PDF from September. That's a really freaking long time to carry a 'mistake' in Army/PDFs! Especially when there were lots of comments about taking specialist Saito on the JSA forum from as soon as Uprising's Army update went live. In my mind, it is a mechanical question. Why did CB remove one of JSA's infiltrating specialists? Saito is one of 3 sources of smoke in JSA, which usually makes 2 of the 3 (Saito, Shinobu, and Yojimbo. [ edit: typically Yojimbo with either Saito or Shinobu, depending on opposing force ] ) auto-includes. So Saito is getting taken regardless of his ability to be a specialist, and him being a specialist has ZERO relevance in why he is taken. JSA went from having AVA4 infiltrating specialists to AVA3, and the cheapest one of those specialists is 29pts (Ninja KHD). The others are 35 (Ninja FO), 40 (Ninja AHD), and 40 (Saito SO).
Im in for conspiracy theory that CB is trying to make Shikami a playable specialist in JSA .. but they have no idea how so they took out a Saito ;) (so here is my tip - add them smoke and 6-2 move ) or (Advenced deployment lvl 2 / Ad unit ) o and Contender is not a weapon you want on any unit beside ones that can be in a link and if consider it a factor that lowers points a lot, ;)
Maybe we should all beg CB for a Red Fury Shikami profile, that will make adding specialist op back to Saito seem tame by comparison
I for one have actually lost more interest in the faction than I initially thought I would with this change, as I really liked the profile. As Section9 mentioned, it made a profile we are often forced to take much better. The thing that puts me off is that our other infiltrating specialists are too expensive and we are still lacking reliable smoke, which to me is an absolute necessity since we don't have any long range superiority pieces to clear the way for our mid-range units like other factions that completely lack smoke have. JSA exists in a sort of smoke limbo state where we do have smoke but only on very limited, and besides Yojimbo, expensive units making them necessary and costly to include. Now, not taking smoke may not be a problem for veterans that play multiple games a week, and I have seen others on the forums answer these concerns with replies that boil down to "git gud" but as a casual player I just don't have the time to play enough that I can chose to not take smoke and not get steam rolled, so this just means that that I now have to either take Saito or Shinobu and an expensive ninja to achieve the same utility, which is hard in a faction that is already struggling to make functional lists with more than 12 orders or just drop the idea of using infiltrating specialists all together and try to go for the new Karakuri which, don't get me wrong, are great but just limit list variation. The alternative being switching to a faction that I like less aesthetically, but is less punishing to non-veterans.
Poor Shikami... I put it in most of my lists, but almost never make it work correctly. I agree that the Shikami needs, at least, a 6-2 movement: very good and necessary for things like Cautious Movement, or for Move+Shoot (or activate Console) Orders. Regarding weapons, Corvus could give it at least a Marksman Rifle, now that it is so popular within the new profiles they are releasing.
Well Shikami with 6-2 would be acyualy quite good - the one with Nimbus .. all tho clunky as fok nimbus is 6-2 allow a good cautious movment or move + doge , And ye i know a Contender one is actualy a AssAult pistiol profile but it strongly implify this is a Clouse combat unit with Aro weapon in form of Contender ... so how on earth it have to get to this range with current set of stats and skills - o ye i know - under Yojimbo smoke Cover ;) a strange thing is JSA require more smoke then HAQQ or Ariadna as thous armys currently can set up a long range fire lines or get in the face in one order with infiltrating units / or impetous bikes .... with smoke ..
