Nomads have been explicitly mentioned in a few CB blog posts/videos as being a premier REM faction, I think the fluff article for Defiance talking about Jazz is one. Would be nice if we got an updated list of intended faction strengths at some point, especially for new players trying to figure out which faction has the playstyle they like best.
Nomads are a premier REM faction, as are OCF and OSS but again I think the problem is CB fucking up the design by putting the wrong toys in the wrong faction and causing issues with faction identity. For example, REM Vostok running Albedo as a trouble shooting toolbox piece. That's very Nomad who have white noise effects in spades, great. However, Vostok running -6 Mimetism as a 2W brute force wildcard fireteam piece that outshoots 95% of the playing field in a gunfight? That's not typical Nomad fare, this would be better suited towards factions that favour brute force and is something that I would expect out of OSS. Why the fuck have Nomads been given this toy? It smells of developer favouritism and situations like this are why Nomads have been getting this reputation. Conversely, what is a Mine Dispenser doing on the Rudras? That's a lo-tech Ariadnan/Haqq solution for dismantling fireteams with superior firepower. Why is this in high tech OSS who favours direct conflict and shares the Pan-O too-enlightened-for-smoke trait? From a design standpoint things would be so much better if the Rudras was running around with -6 Mimetism and the Vostok had the Mine Dispenser. If it had been released this way both sectorials still have a pair of new combat REMs to play with, but they wouldn't be fucking up faction identity and would be staying within their own lanes.
@Triumph tbh OSS is definitely a toolbox sectorial, and Rudra as it is fits it well. Vostok also has a spot in Nomads... in Tunguska, which is much more firepower-oriented, and lacks many of the tools Corregidor enjoys.
Decluttered the thread and edited a couple of posts of their now redundant parts. Please do discuss in a civil manner. On topic I think that, while logically, you discuss what you see, CB probably sees factions balance and development in more depth and more multi year release than all at once, other factions and sectorials will see their spotlight when their time comes.
That's not a good release philosophy you know, it's down right predatory and the most common criticism you'll see about GW on these forums, I certainly hope that we don't see CB pivot towards it. I would rather see fewer Gators than have other factions have Gator-like profiles plugging holes that actually serve a purpose.
First of all, that would be a bad idea because it would mean the game is imbalanced *now*. Second if all, it still begs the question of what Nomads' faction identity is. Third of all, if OCF got, say, a cheap irregular warband, that would break faction identity and wouldn't be a good thing. Ditto for the Gator. You saying "CB probably..." is just another excuse. Barring actual evidence, I can't take you seriously. "Wait and see" is not promising. If that's the case CB should have communicated that to us. How are we supposed to differentiate it from a designer pet faction as things stand?
Some of my complaints are just jealousy on my part. The Gator would have been a great TAG for YJ/ISS. It has some of the CC traits of YJ and NCO. Nomads, a small nation split in 3, currently have now 6 TAGs to choose from. While Yu Jing, the second largest hyper power in the human sphere, has 3 (that's including the Triphammer). One of our sectoral has none and no real equivalent like you could say Achilles is to SP. Su Jian is great but it's no TAG. Combined has 6. PanO has 8. Haqq has 3. Ariadna 2, Aleph 2, O-12 2, Tohaa 2, and every NA2 has at least 1. It's kinda of hard not to think there's not at least a little favoritism. But then it can also just be sales. It makes sense for them to come out with product for popular factions. But then here's the question: why is Nomads one of the most popular? Story? Looks? Or could it be rules? It can be a combo too. But Ju Jing is a big nation story-wise and should have something in the budget for the central police force to maybe fight revolts, riots, and defend against Combined army attacks.
Right YJ might be the second-largest faction on papers but when it comes to popularity Nomads are the clear number one so YJ player buy more shit if you want more tags ;)
But did you see my question? Why is it popular? I'd say the looks and story are just as good as the others. But they have abilities that others don't have.
Dunno if I'd honestly care about the number of TAGs Yu Jing has compared to Nomads. Not really the right faction to compare to as Yu Jing strictly isn't about TAGs. Yu Jing does have a lot more TAGs than Nomads have, but almost all of them are Guijias. Nomads are all about custom designs so bigger variation but much smaller numbers available. What I do have problems with when it comes to the Gator are: 1. Faction identity. By giving Nomads access to a strong and optimized source of NCO, as well as further increasing the diversity of TAG design, Nomads are both shedding their supposed weakness in chain of command skills as well as infringing on another faction's out-spoken primary strength (it's not the number of TAGs - it's about the number of diversely designed TAGs in comparison to other factions) 2. Cost. By comparison to essentially any TAG but the Avatar the Gator has a cost that is just insanely low for what it's actually packing. This is not an in-faction thing, it makes a mockery out of the Lizard. This is not a new-toy thing, either, it also makes a complete mockery out of the recently redesigned Raicho and the new Bultrak. Last but not least, this isn't a time-in-the-sun thing, either, because it was released at the same time as Morat's faction redesign was launched which is not just the main event of the month but also one of the most important events for the entire year. Maybe the price is fair and other TAGs should be improved to match, or maybe Gator's actually just missing Impetuous - which would actually take the edge off of the diversity angle as well since Impetuous makes a unit quite a bit more volatile.
I kinda like the gator skills they don't fit the faction combat style but the tag itself fills in a unique spot and let's not forget all reptile tags are designed by pano so having a different purpose tag kinda makes sense(i expect a riot prevention tag with all non-lethal weapons for Bakunin at some point). YJ in general defends their turf with heavy troops with a taglike level of armor so they never had the need for more tags. to the question of why are nomads more popular than YJ, we have better lore(people just gravitate towards the Nomads lore what can I say people like rooting for the outcast underdog) and better model design(sometimes it feels like the nomads get more time and love than the other factions) nomads rip off more popular culture tropes @Hecaton I agree 100% Nomads and pano do get more of a marketing push but they do sell much better than any other faction @Mahtamori I think gator got NCO to balance vanilla and corregidor with the future updates Aleph and Haqqislam are getting at the end of this summer with their new sets PS: cant wait to get my hands on my new tag :D
Did you mean the opposite? The Guijia has two options to choose from, regular and regular with Lt. for 2SWC. Blue Wolf only has one option. Previously the only one that was like the Guijia was the Lizard. The new Gator is similar as well but does have some things that make it different. But like I said, some of this is jealousy for me. The Gator is cool looking and cool rules for less points than a Guijia. Also, to me, it doesn't make sense, again, such a small "nation" has this fantastic TAG even with an AVA of 2. While Yu Jing owns two worlds, parts of Paradiso and Huang Di, and colonies on Ariadna.
I think he means fluffwise, Yu Jing has a standing army filled with TAG squads whereas Nomads are limited in this regard.
Ok I get it. Like YJ has thousands of Guijia and Blue Wolf but Nomads has hundreds of many types. Ok but that doesn't help me as a player of the game.
@redeemer so it's a self-fulfilling prophecy; Nomads get more and better toys than other factions and thus sell more, prompting designers to give them more and better toys... And with your respect to "balancing for vanilla," that is just BS. Vanilla Nomads is already crazy powerful.
Another troop I'm jealous of is the Evader. They are Haidao but of course better. Every single one of them is a specialist operative with the options to take Engineer. Every one of them has D-charges. Then a big variety of weapons they can take. Also able to make fireteams on their own or mix them up. I'm a little jealous of the Sombra too. Not nearly as much as the Evader. They are Zhencha but of course better. They are the same ARM3+NWI, Shock Immune, but better BTS and guess what? Don't worry about that pesky hacking since they are not HI! They also have one more to choose from. At least no one seems to take them very often.
Not sure about thousands, but they've at least got 7 regiments of Guijia where I'd be surprised if Corregidor even has 7 Gators. The AVA for Nomads are closer to representing how many actual TAGs of that design they've got while for Yu Jing it represents how many TAGs it is possible to disappear from the inventory without launching a full scale corruption investigation - the AVA is more about what you're capable of hiding from the faction's bureaucracy, but Nomads don't really need to hide these assets being used for their intended purposes like this. Corregidor or Nomads do not need to be balanced using Aleph and Haqq as their sole inputs when there's 38 factions in the game. Corregidor and Nomads specifically are also two of the least likely factions to need an extracurricular boost if Aleph and Haqq releases later this year are likely to upset game balance that much. I honestly think it's more about trying to set Corregidor apart from the other two Nomad factions and screw whatever message that conveys about each faction's identity and limitations compared outside the home faction.
It still comes down to YJ having 2-3 TAGs to choose from in a game. Story wise it might make sense, but yet it doesn't. ISS should have at least small urban tactical TAGs for fighting insurrections and criminals with big weapons and first line of defense against Combined attacks. Something like a Gecko. Dare I say better than Gecko for once?
