Let's talk about the theory of GCs
I rarely encounter a GC that is most easily completed with the favoured faction. Although some people did complete the current FO GC with Finalizer + a FO fleet, I tried well over 50 times with a variety of comps, including and excluding Hound's Tooth. I did not succeed at TierX.
On the other hand, using Malevolence + Hyena & Vulture & 5 FO ships led to a solid win on the 5th try, and the first 4 restarts were easy to ID as unlikely to succeed (Restart if your OG Vulture is killed or ability blocked before its first turn so that you can put Buzz Droids on Scythe before Hyena goes, calling your assists.) While the 5x FO ships got me the feat, they could have been any ships from any fleet and I would still have won.
To me this is a problem.
To be relentlessly clear, it's not that I want the GCs to be easy, or even "less difficult".
What I want to see is that in a FO GC, the FO fleet is better at winning the battle than other fleets you could use. It's not about having an advantage over the enemy. It's about having an advantage over other fleets in your own inventory.
Right now players who don't even have Finalizer and with multiple sub-g12 FO pilots are going to complete the GC as easily as I did.
Since GC's are meant to test the breadth of your roster, this seems an obvious fail even by CG's standards. Of course I have my own ideas (which might very well be unpopular) and CG fails even harder by my standards, but this certainly doesn't test the strength of your FO fleet if you need 3 seps and only one sep pilot (Grievous) to win.
And sure, I got Red Crate, and if all you care about are rewards, then the fact that this is winnable is all that it needs to make it fine.
But this GC is a perfect example of how the so-called "favoured faction" is disfavoured and the announced intention of testing your roster is subverted.
Am I alone here? This seems like terrible game design. And again, if FO had to try 5 times with a full r5+ set of pilots and maxed out ships but Seps went 50 times without a single victory, I have no problems with that. It's not the total difficulty or the total number of attempts. It's that the intended faction just seems terrible without really great RNG (and, worse, it's not like it's one crucial RNG at the beginning like with Seps where you know right away whether you have to restart). And "seeming" aside and "terrible" aside, other factions are just better for the task.
I'm not sure what would make this work. A huge bonus in potency as a permanent "favoured faction" bonus during every GC would help. The enemy has insane tenacity -- always -- and for squads that benefit from landing their debuffs, allowing the fleet or squad to work as intended would be a start. TIE Silencer's stun seemed particularly useless to me, not landing a single stun in the vast majority of runs. Since the other side has such a huge bonus in defense, offence, and defense penetration, a "favoured faction" bonus of +X% Defense and +X% Defense Penetration if and only if you include no ships/toons from outside the faction would be good.
Maybe some GCs which are relatively easy with their favoured faction would have to be made harder, but I'm fine with that. It's not about getting an advantage over the enemy. It's about getting an advantage over other fleets/squads you could use. I just want the FF to be the actual best faction in your arsenal. Ripping the Empire fleet to shreds with one relic Fleet Commander and 2 pilotless ships feels bad when a player attempts the mission with a full-relic FF and finds it has such a small chance of success.
On the other hand, using Malevolence + Hyena & Vulture & 5 FO ships led to a solid win on the 5th try, and the first 4 restarts were easy to ID as unlikely to succeed (Restart if your OG Vulture is killed or ability blocked before its first turn so that you can put Buzz Droids on Scythe before Hyena goes, calling your assists.) While the 5x FO ships got me the feat, they could have been any ships from any fleet and I would still have won.
To me this is a problem.
To be relentlessly clear, it's not that I want the GCs to be easy, or even "less difficult".
What I want to see is that in a FO GC, the FO fleet is better at winning the battle than other fleets you could use. It's not about having an advantage over the enemy. It's about having an advantage over other fleets in your own inventory.
Right now players who don't even have Finalizer and with multiple sub-g12 FO pilots are going to complete the GC as easily as I did.
Since GC's are meant to test the breadth of your roster, this seems an obvious fail even by CG's standards. Of course I have my own ideas (which might very well be unpopular) and CG fails even harder by my standards, but this certainly doesn't test the strength of your FO fleet if you need 3 seps and only one sep pilot (Grievous) to win.
And sure, I got Red Crate, and if all you care about are rewards, then the fact that this is winnable is all that it needs to make it fine.
But this GC is a perfect example of how the so-called "favoured faction" is disfavoured and the announced intention of testing your roster is subverted.
Am I alone here? This seems like terrible game design. And again, if FO had to try 5 times with a full r5+ set of pilots and maxed out ships but Seps went 50 times without a single victory, I have no problems with that. It's not the total difficulty or the total number of attempts. It's that the intended faction just seems terrible without really great RNG (and, worse, it's not like it's one crucial RNG at the beginning like with Seps where you know right away whether you have to restart). And "seeming" aside and "terrible" aside, other factions are just better for the task.
I'm not sure what would make this work. A huge bonus in potency as a permanent "favoured faction" bonus during every GC would help. The enemy has insane tenacity -- always -- and for squads that benefit from landing their debuffs, allowing the fleet or squad to work as intended would be a start. TIE Silencer's stun seemed particularly useless to me, not landing a single stun in the vast majority of runs. Since the other side has such a huge bonus in defense, offence, and defense penetration, a "favoured faction" bonus of +X% Defense and +X% Defense Penetration if and only if you include no ships/toons from outside the faction would be good.
Maybe some GCs which are relatively easy with their favoured faction would have to be made harder, but I'm fine with that. It's not about getting an advantage over the enemy. It's about getting an advantage over other fleets/squads you could use. I just want the FF to be the actual best faction in your arsenal. Ripping the Empire fleet to shreds with one relic Fleet Commander and 2 pilotless ships feels bad when a player attempts the mission with a full-relic FF and finds it has such a small chance of success.
