Hi all, I've been lurking for a little while and finally joined up. I've been into X-wing for about 6 months now.

So I used to be really into Star Wars Miniatures, and still like to play from time to time. If you ever got into it, you've probably used the Minis Manager to keep track. A feature I really liked was the cost/hp ratio view, which showed the "value" of each miniature's HPs based on their cost. It was crude of course, as other factors weighed into the value of each piece, but it was helpful for survivability sake and allowed you to compare the value of pieces you wouldn't typically compare to each other . I wanted to do the same with X-wing as I haven't seen anyone take a strictly analytic view yet. I've included only the Rebel ships for now.

The formula is very basic: base cost / total base hit points = their survivability index.

Of course I then realized that shields were more valuable than hull and should therefore weigh more. So I gave shields a 1.33 weight vs hull and re-did the formula.

Let me know what you think, the lower the index, the more bang for your buck.

Cost / HP (shields value 1.33)

X-wing

Rookie Pilot – 3.71

Wedge – 5.13

Y-wing

Gold Squadron Pilot- 2.01

Horton Salm – 2.78

A-wing

Prototype Pilot – 3.65

Tycho Celchu – 5.58

YT-1300 Falcon

Chewbacca – 2.87

Han Solo – 3.14

B-wing

Blue Squadron Pilot – 2.28

Ten Numb – 3.22

HWK-290

Rebel Operative – 3.01

Jan Ors – 4.69

E-wing

Knave Squadron Pilot – 4.51

Corran Horn – 5.85

Z-95

Bandit Squadron Pilot – 2.58

Airen Cracken – 4.08

YT-2400 Freighter

Wild Space Fringer – 2.58

Dash Rendar – 3.09

Imperials

Green Dice (Avg/par is 2.12)

Tie Fighter

3

141.50%

Academy - 4.0

Howlrunner - 6.0

Tie Interceptor

3

141.50%

Alpha Squadron Pilot - 6.0

Soontir Fel - 9.0

Tie Advanced

3

141.50%

Tempest Squadron Pilot - 3.71

Darth Vader - 5.12

Tie Bomber

2

94.30%

Scimitar Squadron Pilot - 2.67

Major Rymer - 4.34

Tie Defender

3

141.50%

Delta Squadron Pilot - 4.30

Rexler Brath - 5.3

Tie Phantom

2

94.30%

Sigma Squadron Pilot - 5.37

Whisper - 6.87

Slave I

2

94.30%

Bounty Hunter - 2.92

Boba Fett - 3.45

Lambda

1

47.10%

Omnicron Group Pilot - 1.81

Captain Kagi - 2.32

Decimator

0

0%

Patrol Leader - 2.31

Rear Admiral Chiraneau - 2.66

Of course, each ship's agility rating is important to it's survivability also, so I'm still trying to come up with a formula to include each ship's agility dice as well. Any thoughts?

Welcome! You're in the right place, and I dig your work. There's a field we call "Math Wing" that looks over a lot of these types of numbers.

A guy who goes by Major Jugler has done a lot of work in this area, and his results tend to line up well with tournament results. I'd recommend you look over some of his posts to get an idea about what sorts of work has been done.

I'm kind of excited to see that there's other people looking into the same information- more brains on a problem are better than fewer.

I look forward to reading more from you.

I would not say that shields are worth 1.5 hull.
The difference is in the following places:

1. When suffering a [KABLAM].
   This is going to be 1/4 of the damage suffered if the enemy is using Re-rolls as their primary modifier, less if they're using Focus, and more with certain upgrades.
   Note that Agility Dice and Evade Tokens cancel [boom]s before [KABLAM]s, so the higher your agility, the greater the proportion of [KABLAM]s to [boom]s suffered is going to be. To get to the 50/50 point, you'd need to expect to cancel 50% of all damage rolled, meaning that your Agility must exceed the enemy Attack, and your respective modifiers must be at least on par with each other.
   Even here, only 7/33 face-up cards are double damage, and another 2/33 are 50/50 of it (a total of 8/33, then).
   Unless your build is particularly vulnerable to the other Damage Cards, this would say that a Shield is a little more than 2/33 more valuable than a Hull, though it is slightly more with higher agility. .
2. When regenerating Shields
   With R2-D2, R5-P9, and IG-88_A, shields are invaluable, but you need to have the escape mechanisms to be able to regain health.
   R2-Dcrew, on the other hand, likes to have lots of hull and only cares if you have 1 shield, at minimum. Better on a HWK than a B-Wing
3. When taking bypass cards
   On Jek Porkins, or any ship that is taking damage from Proton Bombs, you actively want more hull than you do shields. A Proton Bomb can 1-shot an E-Wing, A-Wing, Phantom, or Z-95 if it draws a Direct Hit, but two bombs with guarantee the kill.

I will also say that there are other stats that measure into Survivability: Agility and Mobility.

Agility (the Green Dice number) increases your survivability by reducing oncoming damage.

This is what makes the Aggressor more survivable than the Decimator in most match-ups, and what makes the Phantom more survivable than the Decimator against a TIE Swarm.

Proper calculation of this requires assumption of the fleets against which you are defending.

Mobility increases your survivability by reducing oncoming damage by entire attacks.

Any turn in which your opponent cannot shoot at you is a turn in which you effectively have infinite health.

Any turn in which a specific ship cannot shoot at you is a turn in which your ship effectively has infinite green dice.

Incidentally, the ship with the best Survivability, Agility, and Mobility for its cost?

A Scimitar Squadron Pilot with a Hull upgrade. 7 Hull behind 2 Agility with a Barrel-Roll, for 19 points.

Also, welcome to MathWinging.
This is a problem I've thought about quite a bit, and in a tournament setting, building for survivability can win rounds, particularly if they're at 60 minutes.
If you've killed 12 points of their fleet more than they've managed to kill of yours, you win. Ain't that somethin'?

Welcome! You're in the right place, and I dig your work. There's a field we call "Math Wing" that looks over a lot of these types of numbers.

A guy who goes by Major Jugler has done a lot of work in this area, and his results tend to line up well with tournament results. I'd recommend you look over some of his posts to get an idea about what sorts of work has been done.

I'm kind of excited to see that there's other people looking into the same information- more brains on a problem are better than fewer.

I look forward to reading more from you.

Oh cool, glad to know others are working on this as well. I guess I just didn't look hard enough.

Of course there's always a human/skill element to miniatures, but it's just as much chance with a dice game, so why not put yourself in a more favorable position to win? That's how I see it at least.

Welcome! You're in the right place, and I dig your work. There's a field we call "Math Wing" that looks over a lot of these types of numbers.

A guy who goes by Major Jugler has done a lot of work in this area, and his results tend to line up well with tournament results. I'd recommend you look over some of his posts to get an idea about what sorts of work has been done.

I'm kind of excited to see that there's other people looking into the same information- more brains on a problem are better than fewer.

I look forward to reading more from you.

Oh cool, glad to know others are working on this as well. I guess I just didn't look hard enough.

Of course there's always a human/skill element to miniatures, but it's just as much chance with a dice game, so why not put yourself in a more favorable position to win? That's how I see it at least.

Make your decisions with the greatest amount of knowledge possible, that's what I say

I'm always curious how much MajorJuggler's stats are self reinforcing... Obviously the math is solid, but do the stats affect list building enough to steer tournament results in their own favor? Are people building lists in line with the stats enough that builds that go against the math aren't as well represented?

I'm always curious how much MajorJuggler's stats are self reinforcing... Obviously the math is solid, but do the stats affect list building enough to steer tournament results in their own favor? Are people building lists in line with the stats enough that builds that go against the math aren't as well represented?

That's one of the reasons I'm excited to see 2 people trying to come up with different formulas for similar results. Calculus was developed by 2 different people.

And the world is much better off with both AC and DC.

Oh cool, glad to know others are working on this as well. I guess I just didn't look hard enough.

Of course there's always a human/skill element to miniatures, but it's just as much chance with a dice game, so why not put yourself in a more favorable position to win? That's how I see it at least.

Oh sure! Until FFG announced the Raider, there were some _very_ heated debates about the Tie Advanced, with many people saying it was just fine, and people needed to learn to fly. Until we got some solid math behind the problem, we just had intuition that the thing was broken.

The math was pretty compelling, and FFG's fix seems to agree with it- though they went in some interesting and awesome directions with it.

Your first blush numbers are interesting, seem to stack up roughly with tournament results, and some of the differences show how much green dice (which you've stated you have not accounted for) actually do.

I would not say that shields are worth 1.5 hull.

The difference is in the following places:

1. When suffering a [KABLAM].

   This is going to be 1/4 of the damage suffered if the enemy is using Re-rolls as their primary modifier, less if they're using Focus, and more with certain upgrades.

   Note that Agility Dice and Evade Tokens cancel [boom]s before [KABLAM]s, so the higher your agility, the greater the proportion of [KABLAM]s to [boom]s suffered is going to be. To get to the 50/50 point, you'd need to expect to cancel 50% of all damage rolled, meaning that your Agility must exceed the enemy Attack, and your respective modifiers must be at least on par with each other.

   Even here, only 7/33 face-up cards are double damage, and another 2/33 are 50/50 of it (a total of 8/33, then).

   Unless your build is particularly vulnerable to the other Damage Cards, this would say that a Shield is a little more than 2/33 more valuable than a Hull, though it is slightly more with higher agility. .

2. When regenerating Shields

   With R2-D2, R5-P9, and IG-88_A, shields are invaluable, but you need to have the escape mechanisms to be able to regain health.

   R2-Dcrew, on the other hand, likes to have lots of hull and only cares if you have 1 shield, at minimum. Better on a HWK than a B-Wing

3. When taking bypass cards

   On Jek Porkins, or any ship that is taking damage from Proton Bombs, you actively want more hull than you do shields. A Proton Bomb can 1-shot an E-Wing, A-Wing, Phantom, or Z-95 if it draws a Direct Hit, but two bombs with guarantee the kill.

I will also say that there are other stats that measure into Survivability: Agility and Mobility.

Agility (the Green Dice number) increases your survivability by reducing oncoming damage.

This is what makes the Aggressor more survivable than the Decimator in most match-ups, and what makes the Phantom more survivable than the Decimator against a TIE Swarm.

Proper calculation of this requires assumption of the fleets against which you are defending.

Mobility increases your survivability by reducing oncoming damage by entire attacks.

Any turn in which your opponent cannot shoot at you is a turn in which you effectively have infinite health.

Any turn in which a specific ship cannot shoot at you is a turn in which your ship effectively has infinite green dice.

Incidentally, the ship with the best Survivability, Agility, and Mobility for its cost?

A Scimitar Squadron Pilot with a Hull upgrade. 7 Hull behind 2 Agility with a Barrel-Roll, for 19 points.

Perhaps you're right with my 150% assumption. Though I feel I can't go any lower than 125% minimum, as FFG seems to assign a value of 133% of a hull to a shield (Hull Upgrade=3, Shield Upgrade=4). I'll re-work that once I settle on a formula to include green dice. I'd rather not look at Juggler's numbers and formula quite yet though, so as to not be influenced. I'm more curious now to see if we come up with similar results.

I'm always curious how much MajorJuggler's stats are self reinforcing... Obviously the math is solid, but do the stats affect list building enough to steer tournament results in their own favor? Are people building lists in line with the stats enough that builds that go against the math aren't as well represented?

"The purpose of computing is insight, not numbers" -- Richard Hamming

I am not convinced that people are simply looking at MJ's numbers to dictate their listbuilding entirely, but they are tools to size up a ship or a build. In fact, I think MJ's work is a good way to explain sentiments and intuition the community already has towards particular ships and builds.

On reddit, other community sites discussing x-wing, and on here, I have read people talk about why this ship or that ship is not worth bringing. With a bit of experience, someone who has not looked at one calculation already has a sense of relative strengths of one ship to another and an intuitive sense of worth. In almost every thread about why people use b-wings over x-wings, one of the most common phrases I see are "why take an x-wing when 1 point more gets me the b-wing?" People already have this intuitive sense that the b-wing is worth more than just 1 point more than the x-wing. Mathwing numbers just give proof of the fact. Same for the tie advanced. Same for generic e-wings. Same for pre-refit a-wings. Same for bombers. Constantly, again and again, you can point to the deficient ships that people argue about being not worth bringing into squads, that people already know are handicapped; the numbers are just proof.

Most of the predictive value has been fairly accurate for each wave coming out.

Incidentally, the ship with the best Survivability, Agility, and Mobility for its cost?

A Scimitar Squadron Pilot with a Hull upgrade. 7 Hull behind 2 Agility with a Barrel-Roll, for 19 points.

Actually, I just ran the numbers on this ship with and without the hull upgrade, and believe it or not, you're better off without the hull upgrade based on my Survivability Index. 2.67 without, 2.72 with, as a hull on the base Scimitar only costs 2.67 points. Now the question becomes whether those 3 points are better spent elsewhere or whether it's worth reducing the effectiveness of the Bomber.

Incidentally, the ship with the best Survivability, Agility, and Mobility for its cost?

A Scimitar Squadron Pilot with a Hull upgrade. 7 Hull behind 2 Agility with a Barrel-Roll, for 19 points.

Actually, I just ran the numbers on this ship with and without the hull upgrade, and believe it or not, you're better off without the hull upgrade based on my Survivability Index. 2.67 without, 2.72 with, as a hull on the base Scimitar only costs 2.67 points. Now the question becomes whether those 3 points are better spent elsewhere or whether it's worth reducing the effectiveness of the Bomber.

You should put scum and imperial numbers up, you only did rebel in the first post

I'm not sure points per hit point is a terribly useful measurement. On the table, what's the value of a ship with 0 Attack, 0 Agility, 1 Hull, and 100 Shields?

I'm not sure points per hit point is a terribly useful measurement. On the table, what's the value of a ship with 0 Attack, 0 Agility, 1 Hull, and 100 Shields?

Well that's kind of the whole point of my exercise, survivability. So cost per HP is useful, but I still need to add the green dice element to get more specific, and if I'm really feeling motivated, come up with another formula for movement to add into the total Index.

Incidentally, the ship with the best Survivability, Agility, and Mobility for its cost?

A Scimitar Squadron Pilot with a Hull upgrade. 7 Hull behind 2 Agility with a Barrel-Roll, for 19 points.

Actually, I just ran the numbers on this ship with and without the hull upgrade, and believe it or not, you're better off without the hull upgrade based on my Survivability Index. 2.67 without, 2.72 with, as a hull on the base Scimitar only costs 2.67 points. Now the question becomes whether those 3 points are better spent elsewhere or whether it's worth reducing the effectiveness of the Bomber.

You should put scum and imperial numbers up, you only did rebel in the first post

Updated with Imperial, but it's not liking the excel format it was in, so it looks a little wonky. I'm also working on the formula for green dice. I think I'm going to compare each ship's agility to the average (par) agility of all ships in the faction and assign a value increase or decrease. I just need to play around to figure out how much each should be weighted.

I'd rather not look at Juggler's numbers and formula quite yet though, so as to not be influenced. I'm more curious now to see if we come up with similar results.

When you do, they are here:

Warning: spoilers!

There are some improvements that can be made to the overall method that I will wrap into MathWing 3.0 someday. I may or may not make that public.