I'm a fairly new player, so take this with a grain of spice, but it seems to me that the best remedy for slow-play is to actively cultivate a culture of "fly casual".

I think this culture is mostly there already, but it's difficult to promote that attitude at the professional-level competitions. Afterall, most competitors at the venue - even the ones very interested in good sportsmanship - are not there just for fun. They are there to win (and also have fun, but that may not be the core of the experience at that level of play - which I think is also fine. Games don't always have to be about pure fun).

'Fly casual' doesn't necessarily apply when I really do want every edge I can get to defeat my opponent.

I am baffled by your concept that players have to choose between playing to win and having fun. I am having the most fun when I am playing to win all out against an opponent that is doing the same, regardless of the result, because I will either be rewarded for my skill or I will learn from my loss and become a better player.

And "Fly Casual" doesn't stop the issue at hand anyway, which is unintentional slow play which happens to affect the game, and how to prevent it.

..

During the first store championships, I had my first game come down to time. It was against Khyros. I was rusty from playing a stupid knockoff game... Khyros had 1 awing, with ptl and I had a tie fighter during endgame. He was smart deciding to focus and evade every turn (which made it near impossible for me to get damage through, so I ran my tiefighter and kept him alive. This was to win the tournament, I would need a full win, and he would have to lose for me to get first place (we both won our next game which put him 1st, and me 2nd).

...

During Nationals I had a well known player to these forums (I wont say names, though his exploits for not flying casual are well known to other players). During this match, my opponent killed one ship and slowed very down. There was a point where he had a single ship left to fire to only one target, but took an entire minute to decide if he wanted to take the shot. It was obvious that this was a bad tomato, but this was for sure cheating. It was the final round, he knocked me out (I played and made the cut the following day).

....

So much for not saying names =P. And if I recall, when the "end game" started, you had 2 TIEs, to my one A wing, and it wasn't until the final round that I killed one of your TIEs, taking you from winning by 4 points to me winning by 8 points. It was advantageous for me to get in as many rounds as possible, but at the same time, I can't stupidly leave my A wing at R1 of both of your ships, so I'm faced with the "optimal move" (run away and come at it again), vs. the "need to win now move" (take the R1, hope to kill one of them, and have the E left over to survive the other one's shot).

*Shrug. It was a fun game either way, I hope you don't feel like it was a "slow" game just because it went to 60min time.

..

During the first store championships, I had my first game come down to time. It was against Khyros. I was rusty from playing a stupid knockoff game... Khyros had 1 awing, with ptl and I had a tie fighter during endgame. He was smart deciding to focus and evade every turn (which made it near impossible for me to get damage through, so I ran my tiefighter and kept him alive. This was to win the tournament, I would need a full win, and he would have to lose for me to get first place (we both won our next game which put him 1st, and me 2nd).

...

During Nationals I had a well known player to these forums (I wont say names, though his exploits for not flying casual are well known to other players). During this match, my opponent killed one ship and slowed very down. There was a point where he had a single ship left to fire to only one target, but took an entire minute to decide if he wanted to take the shot. It was obvious that this was a bad tomato, but this was for sure cheating. It was the final round, he knocked me out (I played and made the cut the following day).

....

So much for not saying names =P. And if I recall, when the "end game" started, you had 2 TIEs, to my one A wing, and it wasn't until the final round that I killed one of your TIEs, taking you from winning by 4 points to me winning by 8 points. It was advantageous for me to get in as many rounds as possible, but at the same time, I can't stupidly leave my A wing at R1 of both of your ships, so I'm faced with the "optimal move" (run away and come at it again), vs. the "need to win now move" (take the R1, hope to kill one of them, and have the E left over to survive the other one's shot).

*Shrug. It was a fun game either way, I hope you don't feel like it was a "slow" game just because it went to 60min time.

Unless you are saying the middle paragraph was also you.

I'm a fairly new player, so take this with a grain of spice, but it seems to me that the best remedy for slow-play is to actively cultivate a culture of "fly casual".

The issue is people are confusing "slow play" with "stalling". Playing slowly may be annoying, but it isn't a problem. Stalling is a problem, and you need to call a judge over, "fly casual" or not.

Slow play is in fact a problem, even when it's not intentional stalling, because it can create the same effect as stalling where one player gets an advantage because of the time limit.

Looking through X-Wing tournament rules, there is no rule against slow play, and I agree this needs to be changed, because often times it will impossible to tell if a player is intentionally stalling or just playing slow, so TOs need to be able to enforce a reasonable pace of play regardless.

FFG needs to add rules regarding "slow play" and "reasonable pace of play" to the tournament rules that aren't just about stalling.

It is up to a judges discretion. Putting in hard definitions makes it easier to game the system. Honestly, this is a judge issue. If you are having issue with it, then your judge isn't prompting players to speed up enough.

You don't need a hard definition, you just need to tell players that it's not ok. The current rules don't say anything about unintentional slow play, it just says intentionally stalling is not ok.

Example from the MTG-IPG (Infraction Procedure Guide)

Tournament Error — Slow Play - Warning

Definition A player takes longer than is reasonably required to complete game actions. If a judge believes a player is intentionally playing slowly to take advantage of a time limit, the infraction is Unsporting Conduct — Stalling.

Philosophy All players have the responsibility to play quickly enough so that their opponents are not at a significant disadvantage because of the time limit. A player may be playing slowly without realizing it. A comment of “I need you to play faster” is often appropriate and all that is needed. Further slow play should be penalized.

FFG could pretty much copy/paste these words from Magic into their Tournament rules.

Ah, the old familiar places. I guess we needed something to break up the monotony of all this cool Episode VII news.

I'm a fairly new player, so take this with a grain of spice, but it seems to me that the best remedy for slow-play is to actively cultivate a culture of "fly casual".

I think this culture is mostly there already, but it's difficult to promote that attitude at the professional-level competitions. Afterall, most competitors at the venue - even the ones very interested in good sportsmanship - are not there just for fun. They are there to win (and also have fun, but that may not be the core of the experience at that level of play - which I think is also fine. Games don't always have to be about pure fun).

'Fly casual' doesn't necessarily apply when I really do want every edge I can get to defeat my opponent.

I am baffled by your concept that players have to choose between playing to win and having fun. I am having the most fun when I am playing to win all out against an opponent that is doing the same, regardless of the result, because I will either be rewarded for my skill or I will learn from my loss and become a better player.

And "Fly Casual" doesn't stop the issue at hand anyway, which is unintentional slow play which happens to affect the game, and how to prevent it.

I didn't say that players had to choose between fun or playing to win - I said that most competitive players aren't there only for fun.

So, a player doesn't get an advantage by slow playing before they run out of shields in your partial point system?

No, because you count total damage suffered including shields and hull.

Points scored (per ship) = rounddown[ ( ship cost) * ( damage suffered ) / ( starting total hit points ) ]

Half-points does not fix the problem for exactly that reason, which is why, if you're going to do partial points, you need to go the entire way as above.

Out of curiosity, @MajorJuggler , do you have a model for determining how to break down total ship value into damage point values?

If so, does your model have mechanisms for factoring-in cost vs value judgments that are less apparent and may need tweaking on an individual basis, like Biggs's pilot ability?

Out of curiosity, @MajorJuggler , do you have a model for determining how to break down total ship value into damage point values?

If so, does your model have mechanisms for factoring-in cost vs value judgments that are less apparent and may need tweaking on an individual basis, like Biggs's pilot ability?

Hm, I'm not sure I understand correctly or not. For partial points you would (ideally) just score points proportional to how much you have damaged a given ship:

Points scored (per ship) = rounddown[ ( ship cost) * ( damage suffered ) / ( starting total hit points ) ]

Pilot abilities, upgrades, everything gets rolled up into the total ship cost. If a ship is too expensive or too cheap for what it does, then you have a problem with game balance, not with the scoring system.

..

During the first store championships, I had my first game come down to time. It was against Khyros. I was rusty from playing a stupid knockoff game... Khyros had 1 awing, with ptl and I had a tie fighter during endgame. He was smart deciding to focus and evade every turn (which made it near impossible for me to get damage through, so I ran my tiefighter and kept him alive. This was to win the tournament, I would need a full win, and he would have to lose for me to get first place (we both won our next game which put him 1st, and me 2nd).

...

During Nationals I had a well known player to these forums (I wont say names, though his exploits for not flying casual are well known to other players). During this match, my opponent killed one ship and slowed very down. There was a point where he had a single ship left to fire to only one target, but took an entire minute to decide if he wanted to take the shot. It was obvious that this was a bad tomato, but this was for sure cheating. It was the final round, he knocked me out (I played and made the cut the following day).

....

So much for not saying names =P. And if I recall, when the "end game" started, you had 2 TIEs, to my one A wing, and it wasn't until the final round that I killed one of your TIEs, taking you from winning by 4 points to me winning by 8 points. It was advantageous for me to get in as many rounds as possible, but at the same time, I can't stupidly leave my A wing at R1 of both of your ships, so I'm faced with the "optimal move" (run away and come at it again), vs. the "need to win now move" (take the R1, hope to kill one of them, and have the E left over to survive the other one's shot).

*Shrug. It was a fun game either way, I hope you don't feel like it was a "slow" game just because it went to 60min time.

I read that differently than you. I think he named you because he was using your game as an example that went to the time limit but for the right reasons.

The unnamed pilot, he's pretty much accusing of intentionally slow playing. I don't think he was taking a shot at you.

Since we apparently insist on talking about partial MoV, and the main reason against it is the complication of implementing it, I figured I would throw out an idea that I'm using during my Galactic Campaign. In that, it costs points to repair ships after a fight. I wanted to change some of the mentality of the game by having repairing a ship be much more cost efficient than building a replacement (call me a rebel since I think like one). As such, to repair a ship, it is the % of health lost times half the cost of the cheapest pilot. I also added 3 more points (for bacta!) for named pilots.

So, a 1 hull Luke w/ R3-A2, VI, and EU (35 points), would cost rounddown(4/5 * roundup(21/2)) + 3 = 12 points. Where as he would cost 35 points (and 4 turns) to build again. This itself would not work for tourneys. However, the root concept of % health lost times the base cost would make it relatively simple to calculate, and would still give a huge change from 0 hull to 1 hull remaining on Fat Hans.

A 1 hull Han/Chewy/Lando/ORS would be worth 25 MoV. A dead Han could be worth upwards of 60 points. Actually, the YT-1300 is the worst example since the ORS is SOOO much cheaper than every other ship. Perhaps it should be done off of Chewy's price (or an extrapolated 39pt base price) since Named YT's and ORS are two different ships.

But this way, it is very simple to score. Every damage on an A wing is worth 4 points. The last hull is worth the ship total less 12 points... So for my Procket loaded Psycho Tycho, killing that last hull is worth 26 points. This hurts generics a bit since they don't really load up on extras, so there wouldn't be much additional incentive to finish off that Academy Pilot, but then again, he doesn't have a bounty on his head like Han does, so it shouldn't be that big of a deal to finish him off vs. just get him out of the fight.

Remember that what is most important when playing a game of X-Wing is having fun!

Fixed turn limit instead.

So instead of holding one person hostage they get to hold everyone hostage with slow play, Brilliant!

Since we apparently insist on talking about partial MoV, and the main reason against it is the complication of implementing it, I figured I would throw out an idea that I'm using during my Galactic Campaign. In that, it costs points to repair ships after a fight. I wanted to change some of the mentality of the game by having repairing a ship be much more cost efficient than building a replacement (call me a rebel since I think like one). As such, to repair a ship, it is the % of health lost times half the cost of the cheapest pilot. I also added 3 more points (for bacta!) for named pilots.

So, a 1 hull Luke w/ R3-A2, VI, and EU (35 points), would cost rounddown(4/5 * roundup(21/2)) + 3 = 12 points. Where as he would cost 35 points (and 4 turns) to build again. This itself would not work for tourneys. However, the root concept of % health lost times the base cost would make it relatively simple to calculate, and would still give a huge change from 0 hull to 1 hull remaining on Fat Hans.

A 1 hull Han/Chewy/Lando/ORS would be worth 25 MoV. A dead Han could be worth upwards of 60 points. Actually, the YT-1300 is the worst example since the ORS is SOOO much cheaper than every other ship. Perhaps it should be done off of Chewy's price (or an extrapolated 39pt base price) since Named YT's and ORS are two different ships.

But this way, it is very simple to score. Every damage on an A wing is worth 4 points. The last hull is worth the ship total less 12 points... So for my Procket loaded Psycho Tycho, killing that last hull is worth 26 points. This hurts generics a bit since they don't really load up on extras, so there wouldn't be much additional incentive to finish off that Academy Pilot, but then again, he doesn't have a bounty on his head like Han does, so it shouldn't be that big of a deal to finish him off vs. just get him out of the fight.

I don't think this would actually fix the problem. It would help, but really all it does is move the trigger point. 25 is a hell of a lot less than 60, so the Han player is still highly encouraged to stall the game out. He just has to kill a little bit more before he can do super-evasive. You might as well do half-points, which has the same problem of not truly fixing the issue but is at least much easier to calculate.

Firstly, let's define our terms. 'Slow play' is taking too long to move and activate and set dials for your ships, either intentionally or unintentionally. This is bad. 'Fog hating' or 'slow riding' or 'taking it easy' are doing nothing but 1 forwards or K Turns near your starting area, or even just fortressing. This perhaps is annoying but legal.

So we have a few options to fix slow play

1.) We institute a set round limit. There is no benefit to slow playing if you do this, absolutely no gray area. The main downside with this is some might finish a game, and everyone might have to wait 10 minutes for the swarm players to finish. You'd still finish around the same time because this number would be based on the average amount of rounds played in a 60 minute game. This is my favorite solution. This also doesn't punish/reward you for flying a lot of ships and legitimately taking a long time to go through the phases with all of them.

2.) 75 minute rounds. This mitigates the problem somewhat, also mitigates 50-60~ point turrets with one health left winning against someone with 4 TIE Fighters left. Doesn't fix it completely.

3.) Leave everything as is, and pretend that A.) People will want to out themselves as, 'That Guy' and call someone out on their slow playing, which already never happens, and that B.) A TO could ever feasibly hawk over players to prevent this or actually prove that someone is slow playing.

4.) Partial scoring. This mitigates slow playing a little bit because now that one health 50-60~ turret isn't worth 50-60~ points anymore. The game doesn't seem balanced around this though, Y's and B's and dumb turrets and lambdas are all based around having low agility and being able to take a lot of damage.

5.) Chess clocks. This would be great but would only be feasible for the planning phase. It would also require game stores to buy chess clocks.

6.) Do nothing except nitpick each others suggestions even though half of them are better than the current situation.

Fixed turn limit instead.

So instead of holding one person hostage they get to hold everyone hostage with slow play, Brilliant!

You do realize that with no incentive for slow playing, maybe there wouldn't be as much? If someone was still slow playing you could still tell them to speed up a little. This would be easier because it wouldn't carry with it the accusation of, 'cheater' because the only people slow playing with a round limit would be the ones doing it unintentionally. If you have to wait an extra 10 minutes for the swarm vs. swarm fight to end, um okay. That's better than our current situation.

Yeah, that's another downside of "fly casual". It has placed a stigma on calling a judge over in situations that only the judge can decide on.

Fixed turn limit instead.

So instead of holding one person hostage they get to hold everyone hostage with slow play, Brilliant!

You do realize that with no incentive for slow playing, maybe there wouldn't be as much? If someone was still slow playing you could still tell them to speed up a little. This would be easier becuase it wouldn't carry with it the accusation of, 'cheater'. If you have to wait an extra 10 minutes for the swarm vs. swarm fight to end, um okay. That's better than our current situation.

And you don't understand that a fixed turn limit is far, far easier to manipulate for a win than slow playing.

Partial points just makes things very difficult to manage. And people will just start to game that system. Do you get points for shields destroyed, or just Hull? If you take a Hull upgrade, does that mean that each hull on a 12 point tie fighter is now worth 3 points instead of 4? Way too complicated.

Sure, you can deliberately come up with variations that make it seem complicated, but the easiest and most intuitive method would take a normal adult 60 seconds to calculate at the end of a match.

1.) We institute a set round limit. There is no benefit to slow playing if you do this, absolutely no gray area. The main downside with this is some might finish a game, and everyone might have to wait 10 minutes for the swarm players to finish. You'd still finish around the same time because this number would be based on the average amount of rounds played in a 60 minute game. This is my favorite solution. This also doesn't punish/reward you for flying a lot of ships and legitimately taking a long time to go through the phases with all of them.

This is actually one of the worst solutions. Not only have you made it impossible to properly schedule a tournament, but you also haven't fixed the real issue, which is getting a points win because your big ship survived the game. All that's changed is what you have to wait for; instead of the 5 minute mark, you now wait for the last 2 rounds. Just avoid contact for all but those rounds, then swoop in and kill a TIE Fighter, leaving your opponent without enough time to kill your big ship. Same problem, different trigger point, no real change to anything.

Except for the likelihood that such a change would push us further down the 2-ship meta, as they would be the only lists immune to such tactics. That might not be a terribly popular meta development.

I think game rounds should remain untimed only the planning phase should be timed. If I recall correctly Khyros, you killed my interceptor pretty early on in the end game. I remember I tried to come at you a couple of time with my tie, but you would turtle up making it near impossible for me to deal damage to you, so i opted to just run away and force you into a modified victory... either way, I should of won that game.... I blame wiz kids for making me lose that game.

and the guy who will remain nameless is S.... sorry cant say it lol. I know a few of yall know who it is. So glad Oroshii brought nametags for us, made the atmosphere so much better.

So at what point during the planning phase do you think is too long?

You have to understand that if you call a judge over for a rules determination or an FAQ look up, that the player that would be disadvantaged by the corrected rule typically thinks of you as, 'That Guy'. For example, one time I ionized someone's Lambda shuttle. Next turn when he went to move it he wanted to take an action with advanced sensors before he hit the asteroid in front of him. I would not let him because he wasn't revealing a maneuver because he was ionized with that ship and asked a judge for a determination. It was judged in my favor and then the player had a sour disposition on his face, and as time started to get close to being called he struck up a conversation with some other players and conveniently took a while to choose his maneuvers.

Problems with the above situation:

1.) Players following the rules have to out themselves as, 'That Guy' and short of someone taking a sledgehammer to their ships they're not going to call a judge over. Some players also get rather angry when losing, I doubt they'd react kindly to being accused of cheating, and this further makes 'That Guy' look even more like 'That Guy'.

2.) He was probably slow playing. And I had no way to actually prove it to a TO.

If you simply have a round limit this wouldn't have happened. There would be no gray area.

Fixed turn limit instead.

So instead of holding one person hostage they get to hold everyone hostage with slow play, Brilliant!

You do realize that with no incentive for slow playing, maybe there wouldn't be as much? If someone was still slow playing you could still tell them to speed up a little. This would be easier becuase it wouldn't carry with it the accusation of, 'cheater'. If you have to wait an extra 10 minutes for the swarm vs. swarm fight to end, um okay. That's better than our current situation.

And you don't understand that a fixed turn limit is far, far easier to manipulate for a win than slow playing.

Explain. Also, even if it is easy to manipulate it would not allow for slow playing, which is cheating.

So, because you don't want to be "that guy", you did not opt to call over the judge to watch the game. You would be surprised at how quickly intentional slowplay clears up when the judge is watching. So, it was essentially your fault for allowing it.

See, this is the issue with how "fly casual" has been taken. Calling over a judge is not inherently being a jerk.

1.) Players following the rules have to out themselves as, 'That Guy' and short of someone taking a sledgehammer to their ships they're not going to call a judge over. Some players also get rather angry when losing, I doubt they'd react kindly to being accused of cheating, and this further makes 'That Guy' look even more like 'That Guy'.

See, this is exactly why I am increasingly unable to tolerate Fly Casual, because the way it is applied by far too many people leads to situations where someone becomes the bad guy for following the rules of the game and the systems FFG have in place. That is complete garbage. The opponent needs to learn the rules of the game he's playing and stop sulking like a petulant child. If he insists on sulking, that's on him, not his opponent for correcting him and making sure the game is played properly.

This is actually one of the worst solutions. Not only have you made it impossible to properly schedule a tournament

The idea is that every game would still end at around the same time as a 60 minute game because the round limit would be based around the average amount of turns in a 60 minute game. I acknowledge that everyone else having to wait for the slowest game to finish would still be a problem. This would eliminate someone gaining an advantage by slow playing though.

Remember, telling someone to speed up under a round limit system would not carry with it the implication that someone is cheating, and someone suggesting that someone play a little faster would not be, 'That Guy'.

but you also haven't fixed the real issue, which is getting a points win because your big ship survived the game.

That's a side issue. One could implement partial scoring in addition to a round limit or a 75 minute standard game length though, it's not either or.

All that's changed is what you have to wait for; instead of the 5 minute mark, you now wait for the last 2 rounds. Just avoid contact for all but those rounds, then swoop in and kill a TIE Fighter, leaving your opponent without enough time to kill your big ship. Same problem, different trigger point, no real change to anything.

Yep, in other words it's exactly the same except more transparent and clearly defined and doesn't allow for cheating.

Except for the likelihood that such a change would push us further down the 2-ship meta, as they would be the only lists immune to such tactics. That might not be a terribly popular meta development.

You can already do those shenanigans in the current situation. Only the first point you raised against the round limit suggestion is actually a valid one, all of your other criticisms also apply to the current system.