This is maybe an odd thing to say, but I think in terms of stats and points Ariadna is ok, those seem to make sense in my head. But everything just feels like it needs one more piece of Equipment or another Skill to make them worth those points. In N3 a Loup-Garou was an excellent no frills LI gunfighter, now it looks dated, not bad on the whole but neglected, and with just a little more omph to the profile they'd have a solid niche to fill.
I think thats because of the player, not the faction, Mr Former Interplanetario Champion. PS: The vanilla Ariadna list is illegal
They do actually listen to players, and have some sense of how things are going in tourneys etc. which they attend. People at Satellites definitely tell them their opinions of where things are, and they do listen. The current low state of Ariadna points to fertile ground for some reboots in the near future, I think. The USARF update/reboot that we know is definitely coming up will probably be good in N5, and have a unique playstyle. MRRF seems like the most likely next thing to update after that, unless they add an all-new faction. The Reinforcements models showed a lot of promise, and we know they've been working on new stuff for MRRF then put it on hold at least twice. Guessing that they probably had a lot of development already done when they paused the project those times. As a product manager, low-hanging fruit is always tempting when you're looking for efficient releases. Sadly since TAK is still semi-functional, we are unlikely to see much change there. Who knows though, the Army balance passes/tweaks happening when they release other stuff might add something. Kosmoflot, meh. Kind of a fake cobbled-together army anyways. But they're in the Shenju narrative, so who knows.
This is only one idea, but I think more T2 would be good for them. It's all ways been their thing. I can see them escalating the production to more regular troops rather than elites and special troops. Give it to basic troops like Grunts, Scots Guard, Line Kazaks.
T2 HMG, costs 2.5 SWC feared by God himself. A T2 rifle option on the Scots Guard makes sense, but putting it on Grunts or Line Kazaks and I think you'd need to start charging .5 SWC.
Upping T2 presence on more Ariadna elites is a good idea @Space Ranger . Agreed with @saint though that Line Kazaks and Grunts are a bridge too far, would come with SWC or points cost increases. Units with +1 SD inherent bonus for BS attacks would make sense for elite shooters in TAK, like Vasili Plushenko. A lot more Warhorse would also make sense, thematically and for play options. Would liberate good Lt.s to be used more actively. Line Kazaks seem like a good candidate for Warhorse.
More Warhorse makes perfect sense. Troops that fought each other, the local tribes I can't remember name of, and everyone else. They really need some more MSV too. They can put out the camo but can't do much against it.
I'm not such a good player (especially compared to my local area players) anymore and that's not really an argument. And my bad for the list. Should replace one uxia with an sas or a dog warrior.
Literally already said this and was told it was dumb... It's a good idea for literally any faction that is meant to have "hordes", but specifically Ariadna. It has nothing to do with TAK.
Again: They're terrible at game development. For as much grief as people give about the GW devs, it's endemic across miniature games. The bigger the game, the less likely the designers are to actually be playing the game in the kinds of settings that people claim to want things balanced around.
@kanluwen You do understand how your rhetoric deeply undermines any point you might try to make? "They do not know anything, they are bad at their job, they are terrible" really? do you think we are here just bey been lucky and have happy accidents? I would advice you rework your arguments and be for once, if not constructive, at least useful in your comments. @fari Player been good is irrelevant, or rather if the Ariadna situation was as dire even a good player would not be able to get results, therefore maybe attention is needed to be given not on the potentiality of the faction, but on the skill level ceiling. In any case Ariadna and their sectorial is in the attention of the development team and I would suggest some more well thought feedback would help.
Being a good player is irrelevant.... PFFF HAHAHAHAHAHAHA, OK, go lie other people, can you try to be less corporative? Last season, i saw the same top player winning tournaments with factions that are rarely played (ForCo, WhiteCo, Druzes, etc... I think he was a Barcelona player) In our small community, there is a player that doesnt matter what is he playing, he is always top 2. Marduk won the Interplanetary with Military Orders, when they were mediocre at best, and never were considered a top faction, even after severals reworks. (IIRC it was the IV Interplanetario, but the results dont appear in my OTM history) I faced him in 2019 he was playing Acontecimento, considered not a powerfull faction at that time and not too widely played, and he ended top 4 in that Inter. He was one of the 2 players i faced that didnt play Aleph of any of it sectorials that year Good players can get performance from whatever faction they are playing. Negating that is simply a poor try to excuse CB horrible work with this faction.
I would only add to Fari's exposition that Bit & Kiss are where they are because of a player that used to train about 8-10 games weekly. While the game has an impressive amount of randomness (specially if compared with other, more statistically stable systems like GW's "thousand D6") due to the low amount of dice (1-2 for ARO usually, 3-5 active, all aiming for a variable target number with a critic mechanic, etc...), there are players that consistently win. Claiming that being a good player is irrelevant, Psychoticstorm, is at the very least a badly worded counterargument, and at worst an attack on CB's game system (if construed as "dice and lists will decide it all") and quite the snub against all players.
I guess the idea is that the discussion about the state of a faction should revolve around X or Y unit is over costed or under costed or lacking because of A or B skill / équipement it has or doesn't have. Not about who play this faction which may be confusing. For example Merovingian was wildly accepted as a bad faction. But if only one player plays it and scores well (which happens occasionally) it doesn't invalidate the statement (if multiple players do then it becomes a more solid argument). I guess we are saying the same thing but not expressing it well. Eventually my point is that I need more bashing over the head by some OP faction before I can be convinced that Ariadna is dead. Maybe it will come. But not yet.
Hey folks. Without calling anyone specific out, let me say this: Good feedback does work. The v1.1 of the N5 rules addressed most of the game's the biggest issues, and was clearly based on player feedback. Yes, it took a few months. But it happened, and is liekly to happen again given the positive reception of the community to those fixes. I have confidence the same will happen with Ariadna. Put your suggestions out there, and keep a lid on the anger, and -especially- the personal insults towards CB and your fellow players. That will work a lot better than "I made a suggestion but nobody listens to me and they are all idiots." I took a break from the Forums because of the negativity. It's just as bad now. We really, really have to stop insulting each other and the company. It doesn't change anything, all it does is make this forum suck so bad that everyone avoids it and just uses that terrible, amnesiac format of Discord. I like this format so much more than Discord for discussion (and sharing stories, custom missions, etc.). It sucks to see it die because of a few people who can't see past their grumpiness. There are good suggestions in this thread. Don't bury them in rudeness.
And yet, whenever I've made calm and non-caustic remarks they're always ignored. Burning hurts. People pay attention to the pain. I do think they are here because of luck and happy accidents, yes. They lucked into having a fantastic distribution partner in the US via eFigures/The Warstore. That got a LOT of eyes on them when they were still growing early on. LMFAO. One of the literal things that Savnock was salivating all over(Ariadnan troops being multi-based figures) was something I suggested in a less caustic post, and was ignored until someone else posted it. Why, so they can remove another faction people pour their hearts and souls into helping fix?
And let's not forget that with the emphasis companies have been placing on competitive play, it also means that no matter the company? They're going to be giving more weight to the person who has a "record" of playing in events rather than the people actually playing for fun. My guy, remember that this is the company that encouraged the "it's not your list, it's you" mentality.
Please reread, as I said if Ariadna were as desperate as you make them out not even a good player would get performance, therefore it is not that you cannot squeeze top table performance but the skill ceiling to achieve such performance, while this is a valid complain, its not the same complain. You can be ignored either way, been an ass simply makes it impossible to make a case for what you say.