Clearly, you need to get together with the Shapeways people and build your own sci-fi space combat game.
Get the rights to wing commander you have several eras to pick from and a large selection of ships, they don't make it anymore which devalues the IP but plenty of us old timers remember it.
I would buy your ships to play your game, Bob
Just wanted to say that whether you keep this up or not, Juggler, it's been a great help to me in the last month since I've started and I appreciate what you've done. Thanks.
While it might be exciting at first it might not good for the game if everyone knows it's mathematical solution. Because all you do then is get to fly best with the best possible configurations.
It's very interesting that as you approach the experienced median flying ability (rendering it to a very small difference between two players) that the math dominates due to how you can simply calculate everything into the simple damage results. Firing cycles and values become easily programmable.
Only 2 crew slots on the Ghost so thats not even possible. I think Ghosts are intriguing, they have lots of upgrade slots so they're quite the toolkit. But, as you said, they also get expensive fast and 0 agility is quite scary once you start loading up on points.
Derp, right, only 2 crew slots. No wonder I didn't math out that option initially.
Btw, is anyone taking bets on what will happen first: MathWing 3.0 released or Wave8 in stores?
I would put my money on wave 8.
I might still end up being a giant troll and not releasing it. It has advanced to the point that from an architectural and game design standpoint, balancing X-wing is essentially a solved problem. That's useful information, which I may not want to give away for free. Because reasons.
and you definitely are right about that
MR TORQUE APPROVES OF THIS!
While it might be exciting at first it might not good for the game if everyone knows it's mathematical solution. Because all you do then is get to fly best with the best possible configurations.
To be fair the best players almost always bring the best lists anyway. Paul's Worlds lists are the perfect example, he has an uncanny knack for bringing THE BEST rebel ships and nothing else.
It's very interesting that as you approach the experienced median flying ability (rendering it to a very small difference between two players) that the math dominates due to how you can simply calculate everything into the simple damage results. Firing cycles and values become easily programmable.
Right. In an ideal world you would use this information to make most of the pilots competitively viable, while still retaining very different functionality between the various ships and pilots. It is possible to get 80% of the pilots viable without accidentally introducing overpowered pilots that break the game. (Pareto 80/20 rule). The X-wing meta has always been the reverse, where about 20% of the pilots are viable, and new pilots and abilities occasionally get introduced that push the boundaries of the existing power levels and render previous top-tier pilots into slightly lower tiers.
While it might be exciting at first it might not good for the game if everyone knows it's mathematical solution. Because all you do then is get to fly best with the best possible configurations.
It's very interesting that as you approach the experienced median flying ability (rendering it to a very small difference between two players) that the math dominates due to how you can simply calculate everything into the simple damage results. Firing cycles and values become easily programmable.
MJ's jousting values and other results have been available since I remember first coming to this forum. While it might greatly influence some ships being picked more than others, we still see some less than optimal pilots being used in the competitive scene. I really like the variety of squads we have going at the moment. There are several tier 1 lists, and lower tier lists still win some tournaments.
Yes, but he's saying he's mathematically nearly "solved" the game. Which, I can believe.
It doesn't matter. If its out there, cool. I'd check it out.
--
Wanna explain Pareto's? Also, why do you think we have an opposite Pareto's? Is it because FFG wouldn't do the single card by single card hosue rule style fixing?
What loadouts have you been using?
I have analyzed the Ghost pilots (no title) without upgrades, and also with gunner and/or FCS. Of those combinations, the most cost effective variant is simply tossing FCS on it and calling it a day. I'm looking at:
Chopper + FCS + Hera crew + Zeb crew
... at 41 points as a reasonable ship. Jousting efficiency using legacy meta assumptions with that loadout is ~89% (absolute, not PS derated), with the added bonus of Chopper's pilot ability and the 2 crew abilities. I ran a build on vassal a couple nights ago for kicks, and talked about it briefly on NOVA that we recorded last night.
Who ya gonna call? (100)
"Chopper" (50) - VCX-100
Fire Control System (2), Autoblaster Turret (2), Gunner (5), Tactician (2), Ion Projector (2)
Hera Syndulla (50) - VCX-100
Fire Control System (2), Autoblaster Turret (2), Gunner (5), "Zeb" Orrelios (1)
You're right about Chopper. His pilot ability is game-changing. Try it with ion projector. Every ion adds a stress that they keep, so even once they get away they have a stack of stress to get rid of.
Originally I thought of dropping chopper to the generic, but after a few test games I would be more likely to drop Hera to generic if I need something else(like Hera crew).
Wanna explain Pareto's? Also, why do you think we have an opposite Pareto's? Is it because FFG wouldn't do the single card by single card hosue rule style fixing?
The Pareto rule basically states that the last 20% of completing something takes 80% of the effort. So in general, effective design approaches to most tasks should focus on the easier low lying fruit. In the case of game design, if you understand your system's underlying fundamentals then you can balance the overwhelming majority of units without accidentally creating power creep.
X-wing is one of the best balanced games out there, but even it has power creep and only manages to have ~20% of its pilots being viable. To get these kinds of games balanced well, you really need some egg heads with specific skill sets working on the balance aspect, but the industry and FFG in particular is not known for requiring or paying appropriately for such employees. The FFG developers like Alex, Frank, Jay Little, etc, are all fantastic designers. Howevever technical balance is well beyond their expertise, or generally anyone that works in the game industry.
Out of curiosity, what is the spike jousting value (on one particular turn) of a z95 generic firing a hotshot blaster with a munition failsafe? (so 16 points, but attack 3 and out of arc)
For consumable use items I prefer to use a different "single use" model rather than the always-on jousting statline. It's in the backlog to look at along with all the missiles and torpedoes. A 3/2/2/2 statline has a dice jousting value of 16.4 points, so for that one round it's essentially worth 16.4 in dice. It does not follow that the hot shot blaster is worth the difference between 16.4 and 12 points, however, because it is only for a single turn.
Here is my vote for Mathwing 3.0. I can imagine its not as interesting now that its solved and your life is full of other obligations and interests, but it is a great help to us in determining that 20 / 80 split. The work you have done so far has been of tremendous benefit and has been exemplary of professional excellence and no doubt has helped the designers improve their methods. Wave 8 looks like the first wave ever where each ship released will have things to add to the 20. Thanks again for what you have done so far and here is to hoping that while we won't get a look under the formulaic hood, we will get predicted values vs card values and an idea if ordnance will be worth a spit after things open up time wise for you.
Cheers and best of luck with the PhD!
Without going to deep into your secret sauce do you have any input on Ezra vs Gunner crew? I understand crits have value, but I'm just looking for chance of X damage against average dice and token stack.
Trying to decide how to spend these last few points. Hera crew will mean near-100% stress. Thinking about picking up a torpedo or bumping the ABT to TLT.
Chopper/Corran Mk II (96)
"Chopper" (47) - VCX-100
Fire Control System (2), Autoblaster Turret (2), Hera Syndulla (1), Ezra Bridger (3), Ion Projector (2)
Corran Horn (49) - E-Wing
Push The Limit (3), R2-D2 (4), Advanced Sensors (3), Engine Upgrade (4)
Edited by TasteTheRainbowOut of curiosity, what is the jousting efficency of a naked 35 point VCX, and of a 37 point FCS VCX?
Without going to deep into your secret sauce do you have any input on Ezra vs Gunner crew? I understand crits have value, but I'm just looking for chance of X damage against average dice and token stack.
I haven't gotten around to plugging in Ezra crew. Han crew should be better anyway.
[Edit: or maybe not, if you're always stressed]
Out of curiosity, what is the jousting efficency of a naked 35 point VCX, and of a 37 point FCS VCX?
Using the same wave 5 meta assumptions for consistency with the rest of this thread:
I haven't gotten around to plugging in Ezra crew. Han crew should be better anyway.
I'd be interested in seeing the math between han crew and ezra crew (assuming you're stressed). I've been running fcs/hera/ezra, so most games I just end up permanently stressed, and I've been running ezra over han. The theory behind it being if you roll both blanks and focuses, you can reroll all of them with the TL, but any eyeballs you end up with are misses, or you can han to change the eyeballs, but you're stuck with the blanks. With ezra, you can reroll everything but 1 eye (or even reroll that I suppose), then change 1 eyeball to a crit. Han will obviously be better if you roll a bunhc of eyeballs with no blanks.
Hera crew also lets you find the biggest, nastiest chunks of debris to annoy your JM5k friends with
Hera Dash for 2016
I haven't gotten around to plugging in Ezra crew. Han crew should be better anyway.
I'd be interested in seeing the math between han crew and ezra crew (assuming you're stressed). I've been running fcs/hera/ezra, so most games I just end up permanently stressed, and I've been running ezra over han. The theory behind it being if you roll both blanks and focuses, you can reroll all of them with the TL, but any eyeballs you end up with are misses, or you can han to change the eyeballs, but you're stuck with the blanks. With ezra, you can reroll everything but 1 eye (or even reroll that I suppose), then change 1 eyeball to a crit. Han will obviously be better if you roll a bunhc of eyeballs with no blanks.
Yeah good idea, that might still work out to be better. Stacking FCS + 1 free eyeball to crit is pretty nice. To compare apples to apples though, you would need to run the numbers without any actions, both with and without Ezra crew. I'll add it to the queue to look at.
In practice it means potentially losing the autoblaster turret though, especially with the 58 Dash (Kanan or Kyle) / Lothal Rebel build.
I haven't gotten around to plugging in Ezra crew. Han crew should be better anyway.
I'd be interested in seeing the math between han crew and ezra crew (assuming you're stressed). I've been running fcs/hera/ezra, so most games I just end up permanently stressed, and I've been running ezra over han. The theory behind it being if you roll both blanks and focuses, you can reroll all of them with the TL, but any eyeballs you end up with are misses, or you can han to change the eyeballs, but you're stuck with the blanks. With ezra, you can reroll everything but 1 eye (or even reroll that I suppose), then change 1 eyeball to a crit. Han will obviously be better if you roll a bunhc of eyeballs with no blanks.
Yeah good idea, that might still work out to be better. Stacking FCS + 1 free eyeball to crit is pretty nice. To compare apples to apples though, you would need to run the numbers without any actions, both with and without Ezra crew. I'll add it to the queue to look at.
In practice it means potentially losing the autoblaster turret though, especially with the 58 Dash (Kanan or Kyle) / Lothal Rebel build.
My last couple games with the ghost have been 54 point dash (dropped the engine to get chopper and ezra). Otherwise, yah you'd have to probably drop the autoblaster to get ezra instead of han. Han would be better for autoblaster (since ezra's crit can be cancelled), but I don't think I ever actually used the autoblaster in those two games (clearly in other matchups it will happen).
Edited by VanderLegionI also have a build using the lothal rebel with the same hera/ezra/fcs getup, though using dorsal turret instead of autoblaster, then docked a phantom for the rear arc and double tap and paired it with poe.
auto-blaster sans EU/leebo + zeb is a little rougher, but when run alongside Dash it creates a pretty wide zone of "nope" to cover the doughnut hole
it's a great little bit of insurance v boost aces
against aces without boost (Seeing a bit of Omega L and Wampa in palp aces), it's actually something you can get off quite often or, at least, use to force spending of actions for b-rolls instead of mods (probably forcing your opponent out of a shot)
only time I've never used ABT is against enemy Dashes, because good luck catching that *******
I haven't gotten around to plugging in Ezra crew. Han crew should be better anyway.
I'd be interested in seeing the math between han crew and ezra crew (assuming you're stressed). I've been running fcs/hera/ezra, so most games I just end up permanently stressed, and I've been running ezra over han. The theory behind it being if you roll both blanks and focuses, you can reroll all of them with the TL, but any eyeballs you end up with are misses, or you can han to change the eyeballs, but you're stuck with the blanks. With ezra, you can reroll everything but 1 eye (or even reroll that I suppose), then change 1 eyeball to a crit. Han will obviously be better if you roll a bunhc of eyeballs with no blanks.
Yeah good idea, that might still work out to be better. Stacking FCS + 1 free eyeball to crit is pretty nice. To compare apples to apples though, you would need to run the numbers without any actions, both with and without Ezra crew. I'll add it to the queue to look at.
In practice it means potentially losing the autoblaster turret though, especially with the 58 Dash (Kanan or Kyle) / Lothal Rebel build.
My last couple games with the ghost have been 54 point dash (dropped the engine to get chopper and ezra). Otherwise, yah you'd have to probably drop the autoblaster to get ezra instead of han. Han would be better for autoblaster (since ezra's crit can be cancelled), but I don't think I ever actually used the autoblaster in those two games (clearly in other matchups it will happen).
FCS/Ezra/Hera works better with TLT, getting TL/F on both shots where han would only modify one, and it forces arcdodgers to predict whether yu're using a 1 hard, which 3 hard, or whether you go for the 5k. (though you miss out on the 4 die primary if your too ellusive
will Mathwing ever be updated???
