I visit these forums daily, I read lots but very rarely comment.

I've listened to the Nova Squadron Radio podcast and the ongoing discussion of partial points and I have to say I'm not convinced (though I do understand the motivation behind some players advocating a change).

We play a game that simulates dogfights in a war. The winner is the side that wipes out the opponent's fleet or has destroyed most points when time is up. Leave it at that.

I play as many tournaments as I can, I've won matches with one hull left and lost matches with my opponent having one hull left, maybe that has helped and/or hindered my progress to the final cut through MoV c'est la vie it's the nature of the game.

If someone turtles and I can't take them out completely but whittle them down to one HP, then they break cover and destroy one of my ships then so be it, I need to find a way to counter that tactic.

The point of the matter is that if someone turtles and I have a list for build for that, then yes I can can go in and take my lumps to take him out. The problem is that in an untimed game he couldn't turtle or run away. And eventually, I could work him down safely without having to make a risky move, which his list is built to counter.

In the timed games Large Phat ships have a major MOV advantage. Just look at the current meta and you will see that.

We are trying to balance the game so that MOV advantage is more equal for everyone. Partial points does that fairly well.

The point of the matter is that if someone turtles and I have a list for build for that, then yes I can can go in and take my lumps to take him out. The problem is that in an untimed game he couldn't turtle or run away. And eventually, I could work him down safely without having to make a risky move, which his list is built to counter.

In the timed games Large Phat ships have a major MOV advantage. Just look at the current meta and you will see that.

We are trying to balance the game so that MOV advantage is more equal for everyone. Partial points does that fairly well.

But what you guys keep talking about is NOT Margin of Victory. Everything is a about changing the conditions for winning. MoV is simply a byproduct. You're not saying that a damaged Han should get a win with a smaller MoV. You're saying a damaged Han should outright lose the game.

At least, that's the example that keeps coming up, with Han down to 1 hull point vs 59 points of TIE fighters.

For everyone who is saying that MOV is an "inaccurate" (not to be confused with "unbiased") means of measuring a player's score, let me bring you back to reality. In X-Wing, a ship's battlefield value does not scale linearly with the amount of damage it takes. In fact, for some ships the battlefield value actually INCREASES as more damage is taken (Ex: any ship with Ysanne Isard crew, or Commander Kenkirk in the VT-49 Decimator). Basically, ships continue to put out the same amount of dice whether they have full health or 1 health remaining (barring weapon malfunction critical).

Put quite simply, if you see that your opponent has 60+ points put into a single ship and you don't make that your top priority to destroy, it's not MOV's fault. It's your gameplay, specifically your targeting priority. 60 minutes is plenty of time for nearly any force to concentrate fire and destroy a single large target. For a nautical reference, a ship that limps back into port on fumes is MUCH more valuable than one at the bottom of the sea.

The quote below sums up this concept:

I agree with some of this, disagree with other parts. First, a ship in any condition that can still pull into port is extremely more valuable than a ship at the bottom of the ocean. This is part of the reason I disagree with the idea that a ship's value should go down linearly from max to zero with each damage done. There should be a step that places some value on keeping a ship alive, it just shouldn't be 60 points. A trashed ship that comes in to port is not as good as a brand new ship.

You must also be aware that the point of the discussion is to measure which player performed better so the MOV can more accurately reflect who won and by how much. Your examples of a ships value "increasing" are just absolutely false. Would you take a Kenkirk/Isaard Decimator with full health, or one with no shields and a single hull damage for the same points? See, the thing about the full health Kenkirk/Isaard is that it still has the same abilities as the damaged one waiting for when it reaches that damage point. The value is still in the ship, just waiting to become active. The damaged one, on the other hand, is the same ship, just damaged.

Yada Yada to this "play better" talk. Of course people can beat it. It isn't about whether it is doable. It is about point vault ships being an advantage, and that advantage leading to a very stale meta.

The point of the matter is that if someone turtles and I have a list for build for that, then yes I can can go in and take my lumps to take him out. The problem is that in an untimed game he couldn't turtle or run away. And eventually, I could work him down safely without having to make a risky move, which his list is built to counter.

In the timed games Large Phat ships have a major MOV advantage. Just look at the current meta and you will see that.

We are trying to balance the game so that MOV advantage is more equal for everyone. Partial points does that fairly well.

But what you guys keep talking about is NOT Margin of Victory. Everything is a about changing the conditions for winning. MoV is simply a byproduct. You're not saying that a damaged Han should get a win with a smaller MoV. You're saying a damaged Han should outright lose the game.

At least, that's the example that keeps coming up, with Han down to 1 hull point vs 59 points of TIE fighters.

Many of us are actually saying both. Can you just allow us to say "MOV" as shorthand instead of repeatedly typing "we need to change the value of ship scoring in determining a win and also for MOV score", or shall we just be a bunch of pedants instead?

The point of the matter is that if someone turtles and I have a list for build for that, then yes I can can go in and take my lumps to take him out. The problem is that in an untimed game he couldn't turtle or run away. And eventually, I could work him down safely without having to make a risky move, which his list is built to counter.

In the timed games Large Phat ships have a major MOV advantage. Just look at the current meta and you will see that.

We are trying to balance the game so that MOV advantage is more equal for everyone. Partial points does that fairly well.

But what you guys keep talking about is NOT Margin of Victory. Everything is a about changing the conditions for winning. MoV is simply a byproduct. You're not saying that a damaged Han should get a win with a smaller MoV. You're saying a damaged Han should outright lose the game.

At least, that's the example that keeps coming up, with Han down to 1 hull point vs 59 points of TIE fighters.

Yes. Ok, if I have a Dash who is running 58 points and has 1 hull left and you have 4 untouched academy pilots at the end of the game. Normally I win you lose. I dont think thats right. If anything I should lose because given 1 or 2 more turns dash would die. Everyone keepsttalking about how in untimed games they table opponents and have a bunch of damaged fighters or how the game is simulating a dogfight and whoever survives wins. Problem is alot of fat ship matches go to time and in doing so dont reflect what would happen if given time. Partial points reflects this very accurately.

There is no way you can truly evaluate the "just one more turn" scenarios. In the LCG, the game can completely change around on the next turn. The same can happen in this game. One rare dice result can change who is winning. When time is called, you can only determine the winner at that moment, not any potential future. And the victory conditions for this game is how many points you have killed. Any partial points measure is merely trying to predict future outcomes, along with adding some bad outcomes for scoring and the math is a pain the ass to deal with.

What we have isn't perfect. But, there rarely is a tournament scoring system that is. And the "fixes" people are suggesting would ruin the game.

There is no way you can truly evaluate the "just one more turn" scenarios. In the LCG, the game can completely change around on the next turn. The same can happen in this game. One rare dice result can change who is winning. When time is called, you can only determine the winner at that moment, not any potential future. And the victory conditions for this game is how many points you have killed. Any partial points measure is merely trying to predict future outcomes, along with adding some bad outcomes for scoring and the math is a pain the ass to deal with.

What we have isn't perfect. But, there rarely is a tournament scoring system that is. And the "fixes" people are suggesting would ruin the game.

Since we are forced into time games, we must have a way of determining who is ahead and most likely to win. I would like a scoring system that says the 4 TIEs, who are most likely to win, determined as the winner.

I would love to hear how the game is "ruined" by the concept of partial points.

The point of the matter is that if someone turtles and I have a list for build for that, then yes I can can go in and take my lumps to take him out. The problem is that in an untimed game he couldn't turtle or run away. And eventually, I could work him down safely without having to make a risky move, which his list is built to counter.

In the timed games Large Phat ships have a major MOV advantage. Just look at the current meta and you will see that.

We are trying to balance the game so that MOV advantage is more equal for everyone. Partial points does that fairly well.

But what you guys keep talking about is NOT Margin of Victory. Everything is a about changing the conditions for winning. MoV is simply a byproduct. You're not saying that a damaged Han should get a win with a smaller MoV. You're saying a damaged Han should outright lose the game.

At least, that's the example that keeps coming up, with Han down to 1 hull point vs 59 points of TIE fighters.

Yes. Ok, if I have a Dash who is running 58 points and has 1 hull left and you have 4 untouched academy pilots at the end of the game. Normally I win you lose. I dont think thats right. If anything I should lose because given 1 or 2 more turns dash would die. Everyone keepsttalking about how in untimed games they table opponents and have a bunch of damaged fighters or how the game is simulating a dogfight and whoever survives wins. Problem is alot of fat ship matches go to time and in doing so dont reflect what would happen if given time. Partial points reflects this very accurately.

So partial points fixes that, and yet introduce the exact same issue on the opposite end of the spectrum. Let's say Fat Han has one hull left, vs a full health Academy Pilot. In this case, the Falcon is worth ~5 points, depending on the system used, while the TIE is worth 12 points. A win to the Empire player, even though it is nearly impossible for the TIE to actually damage the Falcon at all.

And with your example, Dash has two evade dice and vastly superior maneuverability. It is entirely possible he could live long enough to destroy all four Academy pilots if given enough time. He might die first, he might not.

My point is that you're trying to design a system that will affect all cases simply to account for a few outliers.

There is no way you can truly evaluate the "just one more turn" scenarios. In the LCG, the game can completely change around on the next turn. The same can happen in this game. One rare dice result can change who is winning. When time is called, you can only determine the winner at that moment, not any potential future. And the victory conditions for this game is how many points you have killed. Any partial points measure is merely trying to predict future outcomes, along with adding some bad outcomes for scoring and the math is a pain the ass to deal with.

What we have isn't perfect. But, there rarely is a tournament scoring system that is. And the "fixes" people are suggesting would ruin the game.

Of course comebacks can happen. They don't usually happen, however. A 1 health Falcon is not going to beat 4 Tie fighters most times. Partial scoring reflects this. Current scoring does not.

I would love to hear how the game is "ruined" by the concept of partial points.

Using extremes is a terrible way to show your arguement. Likely, yes. But how often is that going to be the case. How about a Falcon with 5 hull left vs 4 TIE, 2 with 1 Hull left and 2 with 2 Hull left? Are you so certain that the TIEs will win then? That is the issue I have with it. Sure, partial points makes sense when you are looking at an obvious conclusion. But rarely does the game that ends at time have such overwhelmingly obvious results.

Quite honestly, the truth of the arguement for partial points mainly seems to be "I hate Fat Turret ships". What we have is fine, and I imagine the issues will sort out when more fat ship hate comes out. I suspect that Wave 7 will have that, what with more mines, always a pain for them, and pilot abilities. I mean, Bossk is pretty much a counter to Chewie.

The point of the matter is that if someone turtles and I have a list for build for that, then yes I can can go in and take my lumps to take him out. The problem is that in an untimed game he couldn't turtle or run away. And eventually, I could work him down safely without having to make a risky move, which his list is built to counter.

In the timed games Large Phat ships have a major MOV advantage. Just look at the current meta and you will see that.

We are trying to balance the game so that MOV advantage is more equal for everyone. Partial points does that fairly well.

But what you guys keep talking about is NOT Margin of Victory. Everything is a about changing the conditions for winning. MoV is simply a byproduct. You're not saying that a damaged Han should get a win with a smaller MoV. You're saying a damaged Han should outright lose the game.

At least, that's the example that keeps coming up, with Han down to 1 hull point vs 59 points of TIE fighters.

Many of us are actually saying both. Can you just allow us to say "MOV" as shorthand instead of repeatedly typing "we need to change the value of ship scoring in determining a win and also for MOV score", or shall we just be a bunch of pedants instead?

Sorry, I see it as a fundamental difference of scale. Victories are far, far more important than MoV and SoS. Changing how victories are determined is extremely different than determining tie breakers.

There is no way you can truly evaluate the "just one more turn" scenarios. In the LCG, the game can completely change around on the next turn. The same can happen in this game. One rare dice result can change who is winning. When time is called, you can only determine the winner at that moment, not any potential future. And the victory conditions for this game is how many points you have killed. Any partial points measure is merely trying to predict future outcomes, along with adding some bad outcomes for scoring and the math is a pain the ass to deal with.

What we have isn't perfect. But, there rarely is a tournament scoring system that is. And the "fixes" people are suggesting would ruin the game.

Of course comebacks can happen. They don't usually happen, however. A 1 health Falcon is not going to beat 4 Tie fighters most times. Partial scoring reflects this. Current scoring does not.

I would love to hear how the game is "ruined" by the concept of partial points.

Using extremes is a terrible way to show your arguement. Likely, yes. But how often is that going to be the case. How about a Falcon with 5 hull left vs 4 TIE, 2 with 1 Hull left and 2 with 2 Hull left? Are you so certain that the TIEs will win then? That is the issue I have with it. Sure, partial points makes sense when you are looking at an obvious conclusion. But rarely does the game that ends at time have such overwhelmingly obvious results.

Quite honestly, the truth of the arguement for partial points mainly seems to be "I hate Fat Turret ships". What we have is fine, and I imagine the issues will sort out when more fat ship hate comes out. I suspect that Wave 7 will have that, what with more mines, always a pain for them, and pilot abilities. I mean, Bossk is pretty much a counter to Chewie.

I want a scoring system that accurately reflects who has played better, and does not create unintentional advantages for one ship type, creating an imbalanced meta. I don't care what ship type that is. It just happens to have been fat turrets lately. Please don't attempt to suss out the workings of other people's minds from internet posts. You just do not have the information to know what they think, so don't presume to.

You will pardon me if I don't see how much damage you are able to do is an example of how well you played. It is an issue I have with Margin of Victory in general, but that is another discussion. Some ships are just designed to take more damage than others. Unless you are doing it as a percentage base, which screw doing that math during a tournament, you are still going to have a system that favors one type of ship over another. High health ships will rack up more partial points than ships that ships that are low health.

Changing the scoring system due to the meta is problematic to me, since the meta is always changing. And don't try to tell me that the discussion of partial points is not due to Falcons. It is the only reason we are discussing this.

You will pardon me if I don't see how much damage you are able to do is an example of how well you played. It is an issue I have with Margin of Victory in general, but that is another discussion. Some ships are just designed to take more damage than others. Unless you are doing it as a percentage base, which screw doing that math during a tournament, you are still going to have a system that favors one type of ship over another. High health ships will rack up more partial points than ships that ships that are low health.

Changing the scoring system due to the meta is problematic to me, since the meta is always changing. And don't try to tell me that the discussion of partial points is not due to Falcons. It is the only reason we are discussing this.

You can think what you like. MOV is about point vaults, not about Falcons. Falcons, Decimators and the like just happen to be the point vaults at this time. You see it as people hating Falcons and trying to find some way to get rid of them. I see it as a problem in scoring, pointed out to us by fat ships, that should be corrected. If you could somehow load up an E-Wing with 100 points, kill a single ship and then run the rest of the match, then this thread would be about E-Wings. It is a distinction I suppose you don't see.

Part of the reason you see it as a "falcon" discussion is because you see it as "altering the scoring system due to the meta". I see it as altering the scoring system so that the scoring system doesn't determine the meta, the quality of the lists and play determines the meta. But, it is also a fine distinction.

How do Warhammer and other tournaments do it?

I don't think Warhammer or warmahordes keeps track things like partial points.

They used too. I have been playing since the late 80's, they did it for years. Not sure why they stopped it.

It's also worth pointing out that when they did stop it, it gave strength to "death star units" that were hard to kill and had a lot of points tied up into them...

At the moment you turn up to a timed round tournament and you know what you have to do. As a result players build to fit that scenario either by taking a fat list or something to counter it. Then at the table players implement tactics to fit what they have in front of them. We have a fairly simple game, why change it based on parameters of who MIGHT win if we had 'one more turn.'

A funny thing about Partial Points is that they always seem to be based on how many shield tokens and hull-cards are left on a ship. They are completely ignoring the effects that go into preserving, or even restoring, those things.

Let's say we have a 35 point TIE Advanced going against a 35 point X-Wing. By so many of these metrics for partial points each of those ships will be worth 7 points each time it loses a shield or gains but is that really accurate? Who is going to be easier to "finish" when they get down to 1 hull remaining? Based on partial points they are both EQUAL when it comes to killing them but I think we know this is NOT the case. That Advanced is Vader sporting an Engine Upgrade plus other things so he can arc dodge if possible and if not turtle up with an Evade Token and Focus token to support the 3 agility dice protecting that remaining hull point; that sure seems a lot harder to crack than the typical 2 agility of the X-Wing that may or may not be backed up by a Focus. Of course that X-Wing may not STAY at only 1 hull; perhaps it has one of those glorious astromechs that could recharge shields or even discard damage cards effectively making the X-Wing worth 7 points less each round.

Now if partial points are supposed to be used how are those two ships really anything close to equal despite having the exact same starting shield, hull, and points?

Maybe partial points will 'solve' the problem of Fat ships STALLING for a full will but I really don't think it would do any good in the long run as it would just redirect the issue to something else. Maybe the problem is just that FFG should do things to speed play. I'm not talking about putting down strict time limits on things but rather making it much easier to get the information a player is puzzling over before doing something. Maybe some people are just that indecisive that they can't do anything but it seems to me that a lot of time can be spent wondering "just where is X going to be?" which would be extremely easy to answer in many cases. I know that so many of you are completely against any kind of measuring because it is in the rulebook and I can see why if it is used to stall by seeking too much information but I could certainly see how allowing each acting ship one 'free' measurement could speed play by answering that "where is X going to be?"

At the moment you turn up to a timed round tournament and you know what you have to do. As a result players build to fit that scenario either by taking a fat list or something to counter it. Then at the table players implement tactics to fit what they have in front of them. We have a fairly simple game, why change it based on parameters of who MIGHT win if we had 'one more turn.'

We already play under parameters of determining who might win with one more turn. When time runs out, if ships are on the table, we already score to determine who might have won. Nothing about partial scoring changes that. We currently just do it very poorly, under a scoring system that determines that a 1 health Falcon/Decimator is more likely to win than 4 TIE fighters.

Using extremes is a terrible way to show your arguement. Likely, yes. But how often is that going to be the case. How about a Falcon with 5 hull left vs 4 TIE, 2 with 1 Hull left and 2 with 2 Hull left? Are you so certain that the TIEs will win then? That is the issue I have with it. Sure, partial points makes sense when you are looking at an obvious conclusion.

In this scenario it is not clear who would win. It would depend entirely on the positioning and the upgrades. Lets see how the partial points would estimate it.

Player 1:

Fat Han (64 points): 5 health: 39 points scores

other stuff: (36 points): 0 health. 36 points scored.

Player 2 points scored: 75

Player 2:

TIE #1: 2 health: 4 points scored

TIE #2: 2 health: 4 points scored

TIE #3: 1 health: 8 points scored

TIE #4: 1 health: 8 points scored

other stuff: 51 points (99 point total squad): 0 health. 51 points scored.

Player 1 points scored: 75.

So, by partial points this would actually be a draw. It's actually a very reasonable estimate, so this example actually demonstrates the viability of partial points. This probably wasn't your intent, but, math.

What we have isn't perfect. But, there rarely is a tournament scoring system that is. And the "fixes" people are suggesting would ruin the game.

I would love to hear how the game is "ruined" by the concept of partial points.

Seconded.

You will pardon me if I don't see how much damage you are able to do is an example of how well you played.

I don't see how running away and killing the clock is an example of how well you played either, especially in situations where it is clear that you are going to get annihilated in an untimed game. There is a reason that the final table must be untimed.

I think the discussion around MoV is required to address a problem created even earlier, namely the need to support a binary (Win-Loss = 1/0) scoring mechanism.

Many sports/games (possibly more so outside the US) support the notion of a draw/tie, so a "trinary" system (1/0.5/0 or 2/1/0). Chess is a good example.

Many of the tournament scheduling systems handle draws just fine, especially for the Swiss section (where shorter rounds seem to cause problems more often)

If you do feel the need to try and provide more incentive for winning, you can try a 3 for win, 1 for a tie and 0 for a loss instead of the 2/1/0 or 1/0 schemes.

Once you get to the elimination stage, MoV is irrelevant (and ironically due to the longer rounds there was less of a problem anyway)

Once you get to the elimination stage, MoV is irrelevant (and ironically due to the longer rounds there was less of a problem anyway)

MoV is still extremely relevant in timed elimination rounds, as it frequently determines the winner, especially in 60 minute rounds.

Interesting ideas on scoring though.

I think the discussion around MoV is required to address a problem created even earlier, namely the need to support a binary (Win-Loss = 1/0) scoring mechanism.

Many sports/games (possibly more so outside the US) support the notion of a draw/tie, so a "trinary" system (1/0.5/0 or 2/1/0). Chess is a good example.

Many of the tournament scheduling systems handle draws just fine, especially for the Swiss section (where shorter rounds seem to cause problems more often)

If you do feel the need to try and provide more incentive for winning, you can try a 3 for win, 1 for a tie and 0 for a loss instead of the 2/1/0 or 1/0 schemes.

Once you get to the elimination stage, MoV is irrelevant (and ironically due to the longer rounds there was less of a problem anyway)

The notion that a 'tie' or draw is an acceptable outcome is definitely NOT something that seems easily acceptable to many American. Heaven forbid a "major" sporting event, and it may not even be that major, would end in a tie; if that would happen you need to keep on playing until a 'clear' winner emerges even if it just happens to be the guy who gets to go next.

Now X-Wing actually has FOUR levels of game completion with Win, Modified Win, Draw, and loss where they award 5,3,1,0 points. In the early days of X-Wing there were MANY complaints about that modified win because the threshold for a match win was much higher and then the SoS was used to determine tie breaks and those modified wins didn't look so good there for anyone involved. Personally, when MoV is used as the tiebreaker I really think they could push the margin for a full win back up from it's anemic 12 points; this may result in more modified wins which narrow the field in Swiss but that in turn gives more incentive to push for killing more of your opponents ships.

Although it is unacceptable in elimination play I'd kind of like to see the draw be modified from exactly the same number of points killed to something like a difference of 6 points or less results in a draw. MoV may still give a slight edge to one person but it would be a lot more representative of the games state.

I think we'e on the same page.

I'm trying to widen the "middle" result, whereas all the MoV talk is about narrowing it.

I think Swiss can handle a three result (or the four StevenO mentions) just fine, with or without different scoring incentives.

I'm still heavily in favour of Swiss then cut, but once we're into elimination then I don't think MoV should apply.

I might be prepared to revisit that if I was persuaded that those those people that tailor for short rounds to get to the cut end up being badly placed for the elimination stage.

P.S. There was earlier thread (contrasting swiss then single elimination versus, for example, double elimination from the get-go) that people should also look at for more context around this topic

Just because it has come up, I fully advocate eliminating Modified wins completely. They help no one. Far better to use 0-12 difference as a draw instead which is more reflective of the result than one player getting some points and the other none. Getting MoV for a loss is less important than for a win, and that is essentially all you get for a modified loss.

I love the NFL (despite being a Kiwi) but one of the dumbest things I see there is that rather just everyone shaking hands and calling it a draw (an actual meaningful result if you let them happen semi often) they go on and play for longer and have a team kick a field goal to determine the absolute winner. It's like playing X-wing and after time is called you end up playing till the next ship is killed to determine a winner.

MOV has some very interesting "issues" with it, which I do think is bad for the game (As I'm sure others do)

1, As mentioned it encourages "Fat builds" and in of itself that's okay (ish).

2, The real insidious effect is that it encourages playstyles designed around "Not Losing" rather a play style geared towards winning. Get ahead then do everything to not lose the game. Turtling, not engaging and "Fortressing" the last two are not good for the game.

3. A player can be at a disadvantage before even building based solely on his opponent building to abuse MoV - without even seeing the build in regards to a "hard counter" to his own list

For the record, I'm not convinced partial points is the answer (as discussed). it just seems to strengthen the MoV of the loser.

Maybe something akin to what Flames of War used.

Currently the maximum number of ships a list can have is 8, so regardless of how many ships you actually have there is 8 "Victory points" up for grabs.

2 ship build each ship is worth 4 points

3 ships, first ship destroyed worth 3, second worth 2, the 3rd is worth 3

4 ships, each are worth 2

5 ships, 2,1,2,1,2

6 ships, 2,1,1,1,1,2

7 ships, 1,1,1,1,1,1,2 -(not sure if the middle first or last should be worth 2 points)

8 ships, 1 each

You table your opponent you get a full 8 points, you lose, you get points based on number of ships you killed.

Next round pairing is based off of VP's, not win/ loss.

Fat Han + 3 Z's, the Z's are flat out liability as they bleed 6VP's, but that is okay, because you built the list knowing that and that is something that YOU not your opponent has to accept.

2 ship builds bleed a VP on the easier kill if the likes of Dash and Corren are being flown. Double Phantoms. Aggressors, FIresprays, being that the ships tended to cost similar points.

8 ship swarms are in the boat they were, may be a little better due to VP's gained from the opponent.

You might even be able to use points bled as a tie breaker on pairings