Ever since Wave II was released giving us access to reroll power such as Vader, Ordnance Experts and better ships to use Leading Shots, there has been an significant phenomenon of people fishing for the critical hit in order to get their critical effects off and being astoundingly successful at it to the point that most Imperial fleets don't even bother with Screed and even sometimes Vader if they have access to Ordnance Experts instead.

Which is strange considering that on a black dice, the odds of getting a critical hit is also the same as rolling a blank result.

At first we looked at ordnance experts as that life saver against those sub par rolls and we simply reroll the blanks, confident in that 75% chance of hitting a positive result. But have you noticed that even when people roll a good roll, they will gamble a reroll to get that critical hit and most of the time they are successful? Common Example: Demolisher rolls up and side arcs your ship with 4 black dice resulting in 4 normal hits (an above average roll), the attacking demolisher would then pick up 1-4 dice and reroll to try get that critical effect in order to trigger APTs or ACMs.

A lot of the times its successful in doing so and has now created that expectation that when you use ordnance experts to reroll you are going to get that critical, but when you roll blanks instead we get REALLY SALTY about it, as if the Dice Demons have damned you to hell itself when in fact the odds of getting a blank is exactly the same. So knowing this is it more damage effective to try to fish for that critical even if you rolled an above average roll?

So i am predicting that because so many people are rerolling criticals successfully now that everything should even out and we'll start seeing a trend in critical fishing ending up with blank results!

Slight correction: Rolling 4 damage on 4 black dice is average, not above average. As such, rerolling all the dice will on average give 4 damage, with a good chance of a crit effect - an overall improvement.

I can't complain. I picked up 4 dice on three separate occasions to reroll and rolled out 7 hit/crits with demolisher in the same tournament.

But I'm not sure I get your point in this thread

Also, if you're only re-rolling those dice which do not have a crit, the overall number of crits ought to go up since you need to fail twice on every die to miss the crit.

The probability of not getting your black crit to go off on a glad-I broadside: 31% (.75^4)

The probability of not getting your black crit with ord experts: 10% (.75^8)

No bizarre evening out of probability will occur.

Also, if you're only re-rolling those dice which do not have a crit, the overall number of crits ought to go up since you need to fail twice on every die to miss the crit.

The probability of not getting your black crit to go off on a glad-I broadside: 31% (.75^4)

The probability of not getting your black crit with ord experts: 10% (.75^8)

No bizarre evening out of probability will occur.

The same is true for the blanks then.

Also, if you're only re-rolling those dice which do not have a crit, the overall number of crits ought to go up since you need to fail twice on every die to miss the crit.

The probability of not getting your black crit to go off on a glad-I broadside: 31% (.75^4)

The probability of not getting your black crit with ord experts: 10% (.75^8)

No bizarre evening out of probability will occur.

The same is true for the blanks then.

Except that sane people don't go "blank" fishing. If someone rerolled all their dice no matter what showed up, then it's true: we'd be seeing the same number of blanks as hit-crits. That is not the case, however (for non drunk, sane people)

I will continue to use Screed and OE quite happily, the ability to not worry about that 25% chance of blank coming up, gives me significant peace of mind.

I have many times at a crunch point rolled 4 hits, zero crits, meaning I need to reroll all 4 dice to give myself the maximum chance of getting a crit/hit, and as you already said, I have as much chance of getting a blank as I do that crit/hit, and I have had it happen, and Screed has been there to give me that crit/hit, I dunno why you would ever risk it playing as Imperials, and having a lot of black ordnance upgrades that require crits.

Usually it is a once per game per ship they need to get them crits off from a PBR double arc, and you can't afford for them to flop, I never leave home without my Screed&OE, and cannot see myself ever changing it.

On a tablet, limited typing.

Easy way to calc expected damage is to multiply all possible outcomes by individual outcome value.

Expected damage from 1 black die = (2/8)*0 + (4/8)*1 + (2/8)*2 = 1

Let's label that entire equation 'avgDam'.

Expected damage rerolling blanks = (4/8)*1 + (2/8)*2 + ((2/8) * (avgDam)) = 1.25

Expected damage rerolling non-crits = (2/8)*2 + ((4/8) * (avgDam)) + ((2/8) * (avgDam)) = 1.25

Expected damage is the same. Comes down to preference for reliable damage vs higher possible max damage.

Screed changes everything, though. You want to reroll non-crits because a blank is fuel for crits.

I always gamble with Dash and Ordnance experts. I fully understand it's a gamble though.

From a single damage, the upside of a hit/crit is greater than the downside of a blank....

So fish

even tho I know this to be true I still pick up different dice if the one I just rolled was blank.

I cant help my self

I was playing an expanded launchers/ordinance experts raider and picked up the 4 black dice (3 hits and a blank) and proceeded to roll 4 blanks. It almost cost me the game. Several other times though I picked up 3 or 4 black dice and got 6+ hits/crits. I think it was only once all day that I got less on the reroll and I picked up all single hits and misses every time.

The one place I think you need to be careful is picking up black hits without thinking. I just got into the habit of picking up black hits and misses and going for hit/crit. When I picked up the 3 hits and a miss it was against a severely hurt ISD and with Screed it may have been enough to kill it. I think I was 1 short but I never even checked, stupid on my part.

I was playing an expanded launchers/ordinance experts raider and picked up the 4 black dice (3 hits and a blank) and proceeded to roll 4 blanks. It almost cost me the game. Several other times though I picked up 3 or 4 black dice and got 6+ hits/crits. I think it was only once all day that I got less on the reroll and I picked up all single hits and misses every time.

The one place I think you need to be careful is picking up black hits without thinking. I just got into the habit of picking up black hits and misses and going for hit/crit. When I picked up the 3 hits and a miss it was against a severely hurt ISD and with Screed it may have been enough to kill it. I think I was 1 short but I never even checked, stupid on my part.

Similar thoughts are involved when you use an evade to force reroll. Forcing a reroll of a double hit, crit hit, or crit are generally good ideas. Refilling a hit is generally only a good idea if it's necessary to live.

From a single damage, the upside of a hit/crit is greater than the downside of a blank....

So fish

This!

With APTs, the advantage of re-rolling a normal hit is to do 3 damage as opposed to one (one of which is face-up and could really screw the defending ship) for a net gain of two damage on one die as opposed to the risk of losing one net damage. For this reason, you fish! Re-rolling 3 hits and a blank to 1 crit-hit and 3 blanks still leaves you coming out ahead.

Ordanance experts + Vader all the time

Always re roll every non hit crit with oe. Then, based on total damage (odd numbers important) determine if hits still need to reroll.

Past weekend with demo, regularly doing six damage per broadside PLUS apt. Max damage better without screed.

Nothing except a motti isd survives a demo triple tap like this. 18 tournament games of experience as testament. Only an isd with extra hull lives.

I have run Dodonna lists where an APT crit from my MC30 has such a high ceiling of power that fishing for crits always feels like a good idea.

Ever since Wave II was released giving us access to reroll power such as Vader, Ordnance Experts and better ships to use Leading Shots, there has been an significant phenomenon of people fishing for the critical hit in order to get their critical effects off and being astoundingly successful at it to the point that most Imperial fleets don't even bother with Screed and even sometimes Vader if they have access to Ordnance Experts instead.

Which is strange considering that on a black dice, the odds of getting a critical hit is also the same as rolling a blank result.

At first we looked at ordnance experts as that life saver against those sub par rolls and we simply reroll the blanks, confident in that 75% chance of hitting a positive result. But have you noticed that even when people roll a good roll, they will gamble a reroll to get that critical hit and most of the time they are successful? Common Example: Demolisher rolls up and side arcs your ship with 4 black dice resulting in 4 normal hits (an above average roll), the attacking demolisher would then pick up 1-4 dice and reroll to try get that critical effect in order to trigger APTs or ACMs.

A lot of the times its successful in doing so and has now created that expectation that when you use ordnance experts to reroll you are going to get that critical, but when you roll blanks instead we get REALLY SALTY about it, as if the Dice Demons have damned you to hell itself when in fact the odds of getting a blank is exactly the same. So knowing this is it more damage effective to try to fish for that critical even if you rolled an above average roll?

So i am predicting that because so many people are rerolling criticals successfully now that everything should even out and we'll start seeing a trend in critical fishing ending up with blank results!

I'm not really sure what the point of the thread is, but I'll share my experience.

I was running a 3x mc30 list on Saturday's tournament, all of which had ACM's and Ordnance Experts. I did very well with this list.

In the last turn of the last game, I was gunning down Ackbar's mc80. I had already killed the other mc80.

I was firing point blank into an mc80's side arc and he had full shields on it, but his front arc had 0. It was my last ship to fire, and the mc80 had 6 damage on it. I needed to get 1 pt of damage on it and then ram him to get a 9-1 victory. He had full defense tokens at this point still. (or, at the very least, he could "burn" them for their effect). A single black crit would have triggered ACM's, put 1 damage to the front, and I would have gotten the damage I needed to kill after ramming.

I rolled my front arc (2 black.) No crits. Rerolled both. No crits.

I rolled my side arc (3 black). No crits. Rerolled all 3. No crits.

You bet your ass I lamented and got salty. 10 black dice thrown, each of which has a 25% chance to crit, and I did not get what I needed.

To be clear, I was not 'upset' or salty that I got some blank dice in there. I expected that. I was upset that I did not roll a single crit in 10 black dice.

I finished the game with a 6-4 win instead of a 9-1 win, and as a result, I took 2nd place at the tourney.