Howdy guys, here's my Team Covenant post about yesterday's big (115 players!) Regional tournament.

I had a great time at my first big tourney (my two prior to this, the larger one had like eight players), I got to meet some great players, I played a lot of X-Wing, and -- holy poop! -- I actually held my own and flew pretty well. I had a great time, and hopefully folks enjoy the BatRep!

I know exactly what you were feeling. I went into the Regional I played in having decent success in pretty small pond situations (mostly 3-round tournaments), but nothing really in major competitive arenas. I was genuinely afraid that I wouldn't win a game. You played and beat some top talent, do you think you did anything during prep that helped you against these players? You mentioned you hadn't played your list all that much, but you clearly still did above average against good competition.

Regardless, congrats on the wins. It's always tough to leave some wins on the table because of mistakes, but understanding what you could have done better is always preferable to not understanding why you lost.

Thanks, Bio!

Prior to yesterday, I'd never flown my Dash and I'd used my Corran for all of four games, so it was definitely a learning experience. I didn't do much this summer to prep; my gaming scene dries up when the semesters are off, but on the bright side I'm not teaching over the summers, either, so I have had time to hit the internet to read battle reports, watch a ton of videos, and that sort of thing.

It was all just Theory-Wing, though, really.

So I'm afraid I have to ask you this...due to your strong success with a build you had never practiced with before, including a ship you've never flown before, against lists you've never flown against.

Would you say your success was because?

1) "Beginners" luck - meaning maybe doing things people weren't used to seeing with this list and getting lucky breaks from it

2) Being a much better player than you thought you were going in

3) Showing that meta lists are very strong as long as you're a competent enough player to start with

If it's reason 3 at all, it proves how certain lists in this game currently are clearly better than others, so even if you're not one of the best players around, as long as you're pretty good, you can do great with one of those lists. So I'm hoping it's more reasons 1 and/or 2.

I might go kind of long-winded here, but it's partially that I'm trying to be careful how I answer. It's a weird question to try and answer about myself, because I'm not sure how I could know it (about myself).

I'm not sure how to answer anything close to reason (2) without sounding cocky, but one thing I can say is that -- playing all sorts of lists -- since I got into X-Wing, I've lost three games, and two of 'em were yesterday.

I seem to have really, really, wrapped my head around the spatial recognition and predictive piloting aspects of the game, which I know goes a long, long way. I don't run into stuff real often (Dash notwithstanding), and I can eyeball distance pretty well (maybe from playing other wargames with no measuring allowed).

I've also been gaming for about 25 years now, so calculating probabilities and appreciating ways to modify them (target locks, focus, etc) is something else I really 'get' (when I'm paying attention enough to remember my Lone Wolf rerolls, at least ).

I won my first tournament after playing the game about a half-dozen times prior to that tournament. I just "got" this game really, really, quickly; much more quickly than I did any other wargame, out of all of 'em I've played.

So I guess I'd like to think the answer is (2). That would be nice, if I was some sort of X-Wing prodigy, whose geeky wargaming talents had all just been waiting for just the right game to hit, where all his otherwise absolutely trivial and useless tabletop skills would form a perfect storm of Star Wars flavored awesomeness.

As far as (1) goes? I can't speak to my opponents and whether or not I surprised them by being a beginner and making zany/unexpected choices. The times they seemed surprised, it was by the Flechette Cannon/Munitions Failsafe combo (which I don't think is terribly common and "meta list" of me, given that most of the guys I used it on seemed not to have seen or appreciated that combo before)...or by things I think of as related to understanding the piloting/spatial awareness part of the game (like by causing consistent bumping with Dash in my first game, or surprising an opponent clearly expecting a two-bank with a two-hard in my last game). I don't think those were terribly wild card "beginner's luck" moves on my part, but, again, I'm not sure someone can really recognize their own beginner's luck.

So I dunno. That might be answer (2), and that I just got into my own head and psyched myself out prior to the tournament, because it's been a decade or more since I was "new" to a tournament scene (and that was the Warmachine tournament scene, which was, itself, new at the time, I was playing that game almost since it began).

It feels weird to go with answer (2) though, so it could just be that I'm the latter half of answer (3), and just "a competent enough player to start with."

I buy that explanation. I came in second in a 16 person tournament the first time I played against real people. Sometimes a game just suits your particular set of skills.