Maybe people prefer to come up with something themselves, instead of just slavishly copying what won.

No they don't. People want to win and will in most situations shamelessly copy a winning list.

I think that in this game you'll have people that aren't netdecking end up running the same lists. While there is a huge number of possible lists that can be built with 100pts. many combinations are just obviously better than others especially if you are taking into consideration what you expect the meta at a tournament to be.

I see people on the forum referring to Sideslip's Dash or Theorist's Dash but these are combinations that anyone who understands how the cards work and have similar goals would have probably hit upon. Naming a build combo after someone who was an early (and visible) adopter makes a lot of sense because it makes it easier to communicate if there is a common way to refer to it.

There are very few people that will end up running truly unique lists because most ships have a relatively small number of upgrades that make much sense to take competitively and not because everyone that plays is a dirty netdecker. Even if you netdeck in X-Wing you still need a lot of skill to pull off tournament wins. I love KineticOperator's Six Sigma list but can't for the life of me fly worth a ****.

I don't think people not copying the lists from Worlds is a thing to complain about.

-snip-

Basically had the exact same experience in terms of Wave 5 saturating my local meta like a bad smell

Flying the Tie Swarm really helps alleviate tensions, though. The look on people's face when their easy-button ship becomes hopelessly out-diced is about the only fun thing that can be had about playing against large turrets.

The problem is then you somehow place against one of the three other players who aren't running a turret and are instead inevitably running a phantom...

Oh well, still working on an all-comer counter so this becomes an actual tactical game and not rock paper scissors. The R7 astromech is my next hope given how the fat asses are just one attack eating up half a list, and it works pretty well on phantoms too.

For the competitive scene, who the hell knows? For the local meta, it seems more centered around what's new and shiny atm, which are the delayed arrival of the 360 why-do-we-bother maneuvering ships. Fat Han shows up, but mostly from one veteran and a handful of new players who got the Falcon because it's the freaking Falcon and most have never even heard of the Z-95 .

I, for one, don't build competitive lists. Fly casual!
I don't compete much, and when I do, my friends are the only ones who actually show up. We all just have a good time and don't care who wins

you know like half (or even more) tournament list are swarm or aces? It's just the meta in your store, but if you actually look at list from other stores you can see swarm is still doing amazing. Just because you and your friends don't like a list doesn't make it dull.

I'm hardly to the first one to suggest the idea that it's dull, repetitive, uncreative, and imbalanced. And we are not talking about raw lists in a tournament are we? We are talking about successful lists; a huge difference. I haven't seen an Aces build do well in ages. Swarm, yes, is consistent, but that's already well known as the third amigo in the rock-paper-scissors meta. The fact that the meta has erased vast swaths of builds (basic, 3-4 type ship builds) from being anything but an outlier for competitive play is a huge misstep for FFG and the game, and has stagnated the field.

Bear in mind, this comes from someone who has won the last 4 tournaments in which I've played, so it's not some defeatist attitude from getting my hand slapped by Falcons over and over. It's just boring. I don't blame anyone for playing these lists; they are exceedingly competent. But going to a tournament where seeing anything but a Falcon, Z95, Phantom, or TIE Fighter gets old. Adding in expectations for Decimators and YT2400s in that mix does not really improve the flavor, IMO.

I ultimately don't really care if you agree or not, and I have read many similar posts about the state of the game/meta. Likewise, there are many eloquent defenders of the status quo and, like I said, I want to remain positive. I just don't see change coming until S&V and the TIE Advance arrive to present new choice, but it's not as though the Falcon is getting worse anytime soon. Autothrusters are nice, but hardly a deathknell for Han and C3PO.

you know like half (or even more) tournament list are swarm or aces? It's just the meta in your store, but if you actually look at list from other stores you can see swarm is still doing amazing. Just because you and your friends don't like a list doesn't make it dull.

I'm hardly to the first one to suggest the idea that it's dull, repetitive, uncreative, and imbalanced. And we are not talking about raw lists in a tournament are we? We are talking about successful lists; a huge difference. I haven't seen an Aces build do well in ages. Swarm, yes, is consistent, but that's already well known as the third amigo in the rock-paper-scissors meta. The fact that the meta has erased vast swaths of builds (basic, 3-4 type ship builds) from being anything but an outlier for competitive play is a huge misstep for FFG and the game, and has stagnated the field.

Bear in mind, this comes from someone who has won the last 4 tournaments in which I've played, so it's not some defeatist attitude from getting my hand slapped by Falcons over and over. It's just boring. I don't blame anyone for playing these lists; they are exceedingly competent. But going to a tournament where seeing anything but a Falcon, Z95, Phantom, or TIE Fighter gets old. Adding in expectations for Decimators and YT2400s in that mix does not really improve the flavor, IMO.

I ultimately don't really care if you agree or not, and I have read many similar posts about the state of the game/meta. Likewise, there are many eloquent defenders of the status quo and, like I said, I want to remain positive. I just don't see change coming until S&V and the TIE Advance arrive to present new choice, but it's not as though the Falcon is getting worse anytime soon. Autothrusters are nice, but hardly a deathknell for Han and C3PO.

I'm with you on that. I think if we'll see a lot of list open up if we get a couple of ships in the game that have strong match-ups with both fat turrets and Phantoms while not needing any specific counters take against them. I think the fixes for the Advanced, Autothrusters and Scum taken as a whole have the potential to do that.

I played a version of that Han with lone wolf over predator. It performed very well. I'd say its still highly viable but there are just new shiny toys to play with.

is a huge misstep for FFG

It wasn't their intent. The phantom plan just went a little... wrong.

Another part of it is that you need to actually have the ships. If you don't have a Tantive for C3PO/R2D2, you're not flying a Fat Han. Or if you got into the game late, you may have the Tantive, but the Falcon may be hard to find.

is a huge misstep for FFG

It wasn't their intent. The phantom plan just went a little... wrong.

I don't know. Pretty sure FFG stuck the phantom with a ludicrous four defense dice so that it wouldn't go the way of the interceptor dodo when the turretosarus rexes returned.

It kind of worked. Turrets are back in style and Whisper still sees play with Echo sometimes emerging from her hideyhole to scavenge for scraps.

At our store championship yesterday, the guy who came in second was flying the world's champion fat Han list.

THis list has reached top three in two Atlanta tournaments in the last two weeks, including the FCB Store Championship. In fact, in the Swiss Rounds of that tournament, it was the only list that beat the Super Dash player that made it to the final.

Me personally, I'm working on making three E-Wings competitive. I'm 0-1 right now, but my casualty count consists of taking down a Super Dash in that match. Just couldn't clean up the support.

Come to think of it, I don't think I've ever run Han in a match of any kind.

Which three E-wings did you run? Did the super dash list have a lot of Z's? It seems like 3 E-wings would do well against 2-3 ship builds, but much more than that have a problem dealing with incoming fire.

I, for one, don't build competitive lists. Fly casual!

I don't compete much, and when I do, my friends are the only ones who actually show up. We all just have a good time and don't care who wins

I don't like this attitude that Fly Casual is at odds with competitive play. Personally I would not bother playing a game where I did not care who wins.

I, for one, don't build competitive lists. Fly casual!

I don't compete much, and when I do, my friends are the only ones who actually show up. We all just have a good time and don't care who wins

I don't like this attitude that Fly Casual is at odds with competitive play. Personally I would not bother playing a game where I did not care who wins.

People like to forget that Mr. Heaver's list was during a Meta that was saturated with fat falcons. His build is specced out for fat falcons. That is why R2 is there instead of gunner or something more offensive minded. He has stated in interviews that if the expected Meta would have been different he would have had a different list.

So no, it's not obsolete. It's just a specific tool that does it's job very well, but not all jobs.

I, for one, don't build competitive lists. Fly casual!

I don't compete much, and when I do, my friends are the only ones who actually show up. We all just have a good time and don't care who wins

I don't like this attitude that Fly Casual is at odds with competitive play. Personally I would not bother playing a game where I did not care who wins.

I always try to win. But "Flying Casual" to me means I'm willing to try and beat you with odd or sub-optimal squads. It means I'm more likely to build a squad because it is "fluffy" or because I like the look of the minatures than because the local meta says it should win. Tournaments don't seem to reward this kind of behavior. I have to believe anyone playing to win a tournament isn't flying casual, no matter what they tell you...

So there Rookiepilot, you are just not flying casual enough.

So there Rookiepilot, you are just not flying casual enough.

Or maybe he's flying too casual?

OP, mostly people are super sick of Fat Han. It's legal, it's effective, it's strong, anything goes in tournaments, blah blah blah, but it's super boring to play and play against. It's not even fun enough to spur the competitive juices to try to beat it; it's just a boring, lowest common denominator list that literally anyone can run with reasonable success and that great players can abuse to create situations where it's virtually impossible to lose. That's not to let the Phantom off the hook, as it was a huge dagger to typical "jousting" ship builds, but the preponderance of Falcons (and now YT2400s and Decimators) has greatly curtailed them. Our entire group was completely burned out by the boring Falcon/Phantom/Turret meta and took a couple months off from the game entirely during the holidays. Frankly, it's a **** shame, as the Falcon is so iconic, but it actually makes me annoyed to see it played or use it because of what it has become. Pre-orders of Outriders and Decimators literally sat unopened for most of that time and we played other games exclusively.

I've got my first tournament in awhile coming up and to be honest, even after 2 months off, I'm still not very enthused by getting back into the game. Tournaments have been very good to me, but my continued interest in the tournament scene will be directly related to how many turreted large ships, and Fat Falcons in specific, are there. If that's all I see (which is largely all I'm seeing when I have looked at recent local tournament results), my hiatus will continue until there's something less boring as competition. I got into this as a dogfighting game and turrets have reduced maneuver from the priority skill to third tier at best, behind dice manipulation/ignoring and list min/maxing. I am hoping this is just a prolonged snag for X-Wing and am somewhat encouraged by the direction of Scum and TIE/Adv, but we'll see. I want to remain optimistic, but that may not happen until Scum is released.

Since the regularity of turrets has become common-place, I have find that maneuver choice feels much more important for both small ships and large ships. Turrets are much more able to exploit a mistake, making playing well VERY important.

Also, for turrets, especially the Decimator, choosing the wrong moves can mean taking fire from 3 ships instead of 2 ships, which can make the difference between winning with 2 hp left, or losing by 1 enemy ship. It just really makes for an exciting game of X Wing when turrets are on the field.

Heck, even Turret vs Turret is a blast, as you do your best to avoid support arcs and do everything in your power to make sure your action use helps you win. Really, it feels like a Swarm vs Swarm matchup, where winning was determined by minute choices or slightly better hits in critical times.

I just don't think it's a bad place to be in right now. Both Factions have turret options, and both factions can build lists to combat the turrets if needed.

Well, if it is about being a good sport, then we are casual. We'll remind each other to take actions and dont bicker about close calls on firing arcs and collisions. And we always try to help each other be better players. But most of all, we always seem to have a good time.

I think it's possible to be courteous and even friendly at a tournament, but I don't think I'd be anywhere near as helpful as in a casual game. If you make a mistake in a tournament, I'm going to try and capitalize on it.

Well, it seems Paul Heaver just used a simular Falcon setup in the 2nd round of TC-Aces. It was a 60 point Han with Lone Wolf/R2D2/C3PO/MF/EU. He ran a Wild Space Fringer with it but I don´t know the result of the game yet.

Well, it seems Paul Heaver just used a simular Falcon setup in the 2nd round of TC-Aces. It was a 60 point Han with Lone Wolf/R2D2/C3PO/MF/EU. He ran a Wild Space Fringer with it but I don´t know the result of the game yet.

I bet it's a fringer with HLC and recon spec (no title): I talked to him about it.

I popped in for a second in that match, I'm pretty sure it was:

WSF + Mangler + Outrider Title

39pts

I've seen a few people switch the crew to recon spec and Jan Ors, it was pointed out to me a tournament today, but I'm supposed I didn't see that at worlds.