Aw man, the SAC/Devil’s Maw combo isn’t legal anymore? What a shame, that was a really awesome technique I was planning on using. Same with sac’ing Ransom crew, I guess I’ll either not use them or figure out how to make them more useful.
Both of those techniques SHOULD be illegal. You won’t be a fan of it the one time you don’t use it but your opponent beats you with it. Ransom crew are extremely valuable by generally having great additional abilities. (+5, “free” reroll, etc)
I do have a question about cost reducers like Zuan. If he reduces crew cost, why can’t he reduce build total cost as well? I don’t understand his appeal otherwise- the amount of times a crew selection would go over a ship’s cost shouldn’t be happening that often and even then he’s not guaranteed to do much, so why does he even exist?
Because that would allow for overpowered builds, especially on large ships where you could save a lot of points. It would also be extremely confusing if the reducers let you mess with the build total but crew like Jonah did not – and they’re confusing enough as it is. That said, the 2 point reducers should have costed 1 point to make them more viable. They are only useful in extremely specific situations. (such as the Divine Dragon with OE Davy Jones, captain, helmsman, and Sir Edmund, which is my favorite and by far the most-used combo with a 2 point reducer)
All of those were made illegal shortly after they first appeared (the rulings are by no means recent). They all created situations that were extremely easy to abuse or flat-out broke the game.