u/LastTraintoSector6

So, these boys obviously paid out the nose and were rewarded. And I'm not dunking on them for playing the game - Wargaming gave them the tools, so they used them.

I'm just here to discuss what I saw... which was, essentially, as-bad as a 3x Valparaiso div in a tier 9 match. It was... ugly. Their division all spawned on the same flank and had eviscerated every ship on their side of the map in <4 minutes.

I can't outright say "this is bad for the game," because there are just so many ships that are like this now: where you can create a division of 3-of-a-kind and (as long as you're pretty competent players) assure a win. So it's not like it's unusual to see this sort of thing happen.

But... I very seriously doubt anyone on that flank had much fun. They were all out of the match in the blink of an eye. And I don't see the counterplay potential, aside from, say, a Japanese torpedo-destroyer just getting insanely lucky. There doesn't seem to be a way to break that kind of formation when you have that many long-range manual secondaries throwing that degree of fire (and married to such a tanky hull). By the time the lower dude died, the enemy team was losing 10-4. It was a complete landslide.

I have two:

Guri's Stinger - however (incredibly) niche it is, it makes up for it with one of the most unique designs in the Legends material. It was Nubian before anyone ever knew what that was.

Assault Gunboat - really the 'hero ship' from 1994's TIE Fighter. A bit on the sluggish side, but absurdly well-shielded and armed. It played like a supped-up Y-wing.

I don't think we'll ever get either, which is a shame. The gunboat, in particular, would likely sell pretty well.

I am not arguing that characters cannot undergo personality changes within a short period of time. I'm not even arguing against the ultimate redemption of Barriss Offee - I didn't expect her to become some kind of pseudo-Sith Lord or something.

However, when you look at her character in The Wrong Jedi, what you're seeing is a woman who is absolutely pushed to the edge: developing a deep resentment of the Jedi and the Republic; planning and committing the bombing; murdering her co-conspirators; framing Ahsoka; framing Ventress; and ultimately attempting to fight her way out and kill Anakin.

You can debate whether or not Barriss was justified in her motivations. But her actions were very hard-coded dark side: she literally didn't care about innocents, and believed the ends (framing the Jedi and [presumably] ending the war/forcing the Republic to reform) justified the means. She hoped to escape without personal consequences, but, when finally brought to heel, she proudly admitted her guilt and attempted to defend her reasoning.

Fast forward to... a month? Two months? later in Tales of the Empire, and Barriss is in her cell on Coruscant watching the attack of the Jedi Temple. From the outset, it is clear that she feels awful - she can obviously sense the deaths of the Jedi, and inquires as to what is happening. Later, when Lyn offers her a way forward, Barriss only very reluctantly accepts. In the ensuing indoctrination into the Inquistorius, she almost (but not quite) has to be dragged through kicking and screaming: she questions everything; doesn't want to hurt the Grand Inquisitor; doesn't want to injure her fellow trainees; doesn't want to carry out the Inquisitors' mission of Jedi-hunting, etc. And, of course, ultimately she turns on Lyn and runs away.

As I said at the outset, I don't really have a problem with characters having a change of heart. But it feels like Barriss' is completely unearned - like she spends a few weeks in the clink off-screen and is suddenly virtually a Jedi again; that she never really commits to evil; to her own practiced philosophy before reforming. Again, this is a woman who murdered a whole bunch of her allies in cold blood, defiantly proclaimed her guilt, and went to prison for it - and we're supposed to believe that she's back to square one pretty much immediately as soon as the Inquisitors ask for her help? She doesn't wholesale throw herself into the mission for even a little while before developing doubts?

I dunno. I was just hoping for a little more before Barriss walked back towards the light. Whether you like her dark turn in Clone Wars or not, it was at least fairly believably constructed. Having it all immediately stepped back felt jarring and a bit silly.

This isn't a "I didn't get my chemist this time" whine thread. I'm fine with whatever the two new jobs wind up being.

I just wish we would eventually get that job. Although I play Sage and WHM a fair bit, neither really fits the concept of what I want my character doing; how I perceive and RP her. And the idea of a rifle (or pistol, or dagger)-toting, potion-lobbing little alchemist toddling around through a battlefield chucking bottles everywhere just sounds so appealing to me. I always had a chemist in-tow in FFT, and would like to see the job revived here... eventually.

That's all. Again, not crying - wasn't expecting it; didn't have my hopes pinned on it; am excited to see what we get. But I would one day love that job.

Just looks much closer to the real thing, and proportionally better. The nose, in particular, is a big upgrade.

This is silly, but I figured I'd share it.

This one is a bit hidden in the trees.

This was the lead ship of the third group of Didos, with a reduced main battery, lower superstructure, and enhanced AA group.

Now, I know it's undergunned as hell for a light cruiser. But, let's be honest: stats are really soft these days. So WG could do whatever they wanted with it - upgrade the ROF; give it a reload booster; radar; smoke; whatever... you know, the typical assortment of gimmicks.

I just like her lines - she was really a sleek looking ship... almost like a really big, mean destroyer. And since the hull and turrets are already in the client, the modifications they would have to do to make a 'new' ship would be much-reduced.

Unlike a lot of people, I don't mind the anime-themed events - I like a lot of the camoflages (in fact, I like a good portion of the weird camos across all events), and the voice actors associated with each ship are a nice change of pace (my permanent go-to is AL Cleveland).

Anyway, I'm not one of those guys who just spam queues my Massachusetts variants - I like them; I play them now and then, but they aren't part of my normal rotation by any means. But the new AL Massachusetts camo is just... cool. I like the pixelated lower hull; I like the washed-out use of red white and blue... it's a really nice design.

However, according to Potato Quality, the math to even assure a 90% drop requires north of $2000 USD. Yes, that's three zeroes - two-thousand dollars for what amounts to a skin (since, let's be honest - you can get Massachusetts on Black Friday for a rather paltry sum once-a-year).

So... obviously, I'm not doing that. In fact, I doubt there are more than a handful of people worldwide who are doing that. Which stinks. Because it really is neat. But it's also just a skin.