Discuss?!

The Advantages listed on your Objective Cards.

The two biggest advantages of going 2nd, are being able to deploy your ships to react to the First Player's deployment, and being able to tailor the objectives to your list. You could also say that there is an advantage in forcing the opposing player to move first if you are setup where whoever moves first will be the first player into range.

The advantage is mitigated by the First Player being able to move first each turn, potentially avoiding damage by dodging arcs or blowing up a heavily damaged ship before it could fire or repair. Also, the First Player can select the objective that is least bad verses their list, and may in fact be better for their list than yours.

I personally think one of the most important things in the game is your initial placement of your forces. I love going second for that reason alone. I have won many a game because my opponent placed his ships too far apart and I was able to cluster mine appropriately and focus down his ships one at a time. This really plays into the current meta for Rebels with fast moving ships. Many times what happens is my opponents get over anxious and speed up their ships to engage me only to blow past mine (which are always going at speed 3) allowing me to swing in behind them. I usually also drop a hornets nest of squadrons right in front of them.

yup

objectives and, perhaps more importantly, letting them come to you

hmmm...tasty Gladiators

If one of your objectives is better for their fleet than yours, you did it wrong.

If one of your objectives is better for their fleet than yours, you did it wrong.

I'm not sure this is necessarily true; sometimes it is a product of matchups and the way the meta is a bit of a random sort at times.

As an example: if you are a rebel, and you are picking objectives for a lightweight, fast-moving fleet, you tend to pick something like Firing Lanes as one of your objectives. And you win that most of the time against Imperials or anyone with a lot of squadrons... but every once in a while, you find the jerk with the 6xCR90 fleet, and your objective is better for him than you. It should be rare, but unless your list is the most extreme version of what you can do possible on some axis of fleet building and your objectives are tailored for you, it will happen sometimes.

To that end, I play the 6xCR90 list occasionally, and I think one of the most underrated values of that list is flipping the objective game around and often making opposing objectives quite good for you, which is brutal if you are also going first. So if I go first, but have to pick one of your objectives, and you were an Imperial who was rocking something like Opening Salvo, that seems nice until you realize you just handed me 12 more red dice on the first turn I get into range, and you're about to eat 24 of them combined (which is an average of 18 damage in a single turn) at long range. If you drop two glads before they even get in range, it's pretty much game over.

Also, on the topic of going second, if you are a fleet that doesn't want to engage at close range, sometimes this is great. You get to see where the opponent is going before moving, you force them to close with you, shoot, and then move away. If you go second as a rebel player and have ships like Corvettes, it can be very frustrating for people to chase you around constantly.

If one of your objectives is better for their fleet than yours, you did it wrong.

I'm not sure this is necessarily true; sometimes it is a product of matchups and the way the meta is a bit of a random sort at times.

As an example: if you are a rebel, and you are picking objectives for a lightweight, fast-moving fleet, you tend to pick something like Firing Lanes as one of your objectives

ew, no you don't

fleet ambush or hyperspace are your defaults

Firing Lanes is basically star destroyer exclusive

so far, it's largely true that if your objectives benefit your opponent more then you dun goofed

this can be incredibly obvious (firing lanes v destroyers) or more subtle (any positioning objective at all V GSD spam is a bad idea because they adore knowing where you have to go)

If one of your objectives is better for their fleet than yours, you did it wrong.

I'm not sure this is necessarily true; sometimes it is a product of matchups and the way the meta is a bit of a random sort at times.

As an example: if you are a rebel, and you are picking objectives for a lightweight, fast-moving fleet, you tend to pick something like Firing Lanes as one of your objectives

ew, no you don't

fleet ambush or hyperspace are your defaults

Firing Lanes is basically star destroyer exclusive

so far, it's largely true that if your objectives benefit your opponent more then you dun goofed

this can be incredibly obvious (firing lanes v destroyers) or more subtle (any positioning objective at all V GSD spam is a bad idea because they adore knowing where you have to go)

Actually firing lanes are great for rebels. VSDs will try to keep their front arcs pointed at the objectives or try to point them at you. either way you take advantage and try to out maneuver them. You should have more red dice than the imperials meaning at any given time you should be able to bring more dice to bare on 2 out of three of the objectives.

I've only played it once but it seemed to heavily favor fast rebels with side arcs

On the side-topic of objectives: I feel like Hyperspace Assault is a TERRIBLE objective for any rebel fleet that is not rocking Yavaris and bombers. You do not want to be popping out a small or medium rebel ship on its own just to be turned into lunch meat, especially not having had them on the board to start banking tokens early. Rebels engage well at long range, often want to be moving sidelong to the Imperials, and benefits from banking nav tokens early to make movement even more unpredictable for short-ranged imperial ships.

Hyperspace Assault is, at best, a neutral with regard to all of this and often a negative. Short of wanting a B-Wing delivery option, I don't forsee how this would ever be better than at least Fleet Ambush for the rebels (and, depending on your list, Fire Lanes, though lists with only 2-3 ships will hate that).

TL;DR: IT'S A TRAP.

don't pop out yavaris Bs where it can be reacted to (and outrun)

pop out salvation on the bad side of an enemy's formation and roll dice till the cows come home

Theres more reasons to go second than first in armada, which is unusual compared to other games. least when you play with the objectives that is. Some of those cards straight up say the 2nd player has better perks, not even debatable ones just straight up better. Heck theres one that i dont get why it exists since the first player picks the card from the 2nd player's hand, and it literally does NOTHING for the first player lol why does that even exist?

If one of your objectives is better for their fleet than yours, you did it wrong.

That's a bit reductive.

For instance, I took a bomber-heavy (3 TIE bombers + rhymer + 2 advanced) into a match with Precision Strike as one of my objectives.

Against virtually ANY fleet, this choice makes good sense, as my bombers can possibly flip four damage cards and take four tokens per turn in addition to my ship activations.

He brought 10 Y-Wings.

In that case, you can guess who was scoring more objective tokens.

Part of being a good player, in my opinion, is learning how to turn your opponent's objectives against him. It's one of the reasons I love the objective system.

If one of your objectives is better for their fleet than yours, you did it wrong.

I'm not sure this is necessarily true; sometimes it is a product of matchups and the way the meta is a bit of a random sort at times.

As an example: if you are a rebel, and you are picking objectives for a lightweight, fast-moving fleet, you tend to pick something like Firing Lanes as one of your objectives

ew, no you don't

fleet ambush or hyperspace are your defaults

Firing Lanes is basically star destroyer exclusive

so far, it's largely true that if your objectives benefit your opponent more then you dun goofed

this can be incredibly obvious (firing lanes v destroyers) or more subtle (any positioning objective at all V GSD spam is a bad idea because they adore knowing where you have to go)

Actually firing lanes are great for rebels. VSDs will try to keep their front arcs pointed at the objectives or try to point them at you. either way you take advantage and try to out maneuver them. You should have more red dice than the imperials meaning at any given time you should be able to bring more dice to bare on 2 out of three of the objectives.

I've only played it once but it seemed to heavily favor fast rebels with side arcs

What is the timing secuence of picking objectives?

I guess my real question is, do I "know" what my opponents fleet is before we decide on 1st and 2nd player and what objectives are picked?

If you do know or at least have an idea of what the opponents fleet is, does this further help you make the above choices?

What is the timing secuence of picking objectives?

I guess my real question is, do I "know" what my opponents fleet is before we decide on 1st and 2nd player and what objectives are picked?

If you do know or at least have an idea of what the opponents fleet is, does this further help you make the above choices?

Objectives are revealed and picked after initiative is assigned.

You can know everything in your opponent's list with the exception of the objectives, since his list value vs your list value determines initiative pick in the first place.

Once you play all the objectives, you'll start to get a good idea of which fleets will include which ones.

Quite often you get to shoot first, that can be nice, more so if you get second and third.

What is the timing secuence of picking objectives?

I guess my real question is, do I "know" what my opponents fleet is before we decide on 1st and 2nd player and what objectives are picked?

If you do know or at least have an idea of what the opponents fleet is, does this further help you make the above choices?

You have to have 3 objectives chosen, one of each color, when initially building your list. You arrive at the tournament with those 3 obkextives, and you use those 3 in every round.

The player chosen to go first chooses 1 of the 3 objectives the second player brought after fleets are revealed.

You choose objectives while list building so before you know what your opponent(s) are bringing.

I like others going second.