OK I'm going to play the devils advocate here(and will get burnt for doing so ), after reading your rant a few times here and all the positive feed back you received there are a few honest truths that are stuck in in my throat.
You stated that you aren't old enough to drink but I'm guessing by your language aren't 10 years old either so you may know what a life lesson is....

• Entering anything at a competitive level people pull the gloves off and are there to win
• You stated you have little experience and don't get to play often, but wanted to come home with store credit, going into this your goals may have been unrealistic
• People joke around about lists and how they are played, as you seem to have been in an overly down mood this can easily be taken in a personal way that may not have been intended
• That the guy always flew his TIE defenders so he got an evade token well that's why the list is designed to do
• You actually HATE the guy, I wonder what he thinks about that and how he feels about you. Especially as they may well be here in this forum
• Maybe you need to play a list with predator in it as its a great card
• Feeling unsatisfied at Rogue One.... Personal problem and nothing to do with the tournament. Personally I Loved it, IMHO it was made for those that saw a new hope back in 77
• In a Swiss pairing there will always be one person with 0 wins, that how Swiss works. In this case it was you. Sux but thats life

I could go on but I have more important things to do, so to cut a long story short.... " You had a bad day so build a bridge and get over it "

i cant speak to annoying gamers as that is the inveitable fate of all games that are even the least bit competitive

But power creep? We're seeing some incredible variety atm

The only trick you need to have a nonmeta list do well is this: **** dice

Uofrade to modify them/ignore them/overcome guaranteed defenses

Ideally all of the above

Indeed. At it's basic level, X-wing is a dice game.

But - the point of maneuvers, and card tricks, and strategy (your overall plan, like "let him come to me", "go for manaroo" "hold back then sprint for range 1 to avoid the torps") and tactics (like "if I do a speed 1 turn now, he's gonna bump", "fire this guy first because the other has a choice of targets if I get a kill") all ultimately boil down to ways to load the dice in your favour - how many you get to roll, how many you get to reroll, and how many results on those dice "count".

That's not the same as saying they aren't important. A dice-modifier-ed out the wazoo 'rubbish' ship will eat an unmodified ship with ease....that is, after all, essentially the whole reason Omega Leader is a thing.

flying a meta list and flying well aren't mutually exclusive

Indeed. It's usually become a meta list for a reason, after all, and the reason is usually "several good players started flying it".

At the same time, a really good player tends to personalise their list. You'll often find it'll be a 'meta list' but with a few tweaks (like Paul Heaver's anti-fat-han-fat-han, or the upmty-ump slight variations covered by the phrases "2 arcs and biggs" or "palp aces"). Often the variant also ends up as a 'meta list'.

the point about learning from your mistakes - this is vital - recognise where you went wrong, and do your best not to repeat it. But importantly, don't dwell on your bad beats, and especially don't dwell on your stupid mistakes. Once you've filed the lessons learned away, keep them that way if you can

There's an old military quote from the Duke of Wellington: "They came on in the same old way and we stopped them in the same old way" .

If you play a game, and lose, for any reason other than dear-holy-god-can-you-not-roll-one-bloody-evade-on-a-dozen-bloody-green-dice (at which point you are officially allowed to write the game off to "variance"...), then if you want to win, you need to try approaching differently.

As a rule, if someone fortresses up, they want you to come to them. So, the first instinct should be "don't".

After that.....if you do need to move up and engage, take the chance to dictate the terms of the fight rather than necessarily taking the easy target. That shuttle is the obvious first target (and might take out palpatine!) but.....given what happened, obviously wasn't the right choice. So maybe one of the defenders instead. Try the game again, but try a different approach....

decided not to spend my focus on my bomber to dodge a single crit so I could retaliate. I got Blinded Pilot.

Yup. I don't know why people are getting so riled up about Kylo Ren; I seem to take a Blinded Pilot critical (or a direct hit) with tiresome predictability anyway!

"Oh well, it's only one critical, and at least he's unhurt."

Major Explosion. Direct Hit.

"Oh, for....."

i dodge crits every time i can, purely for that reason. I never, ever draw meh crits when i had a chance to avoid it.

Blinded Pilot is actually really rare for me to get. Usually i get Major -> Direct hit lol. Or bump = damage on a ship that cant avoid bumping for a couple rounds....

i dodge crits every time i can, purely for that reason. I never, ever draw meh crits when i had a chance to avoid it.

Blinded Pilot is actually really rare for me to get. Usually i get Major -> Direct hit lol. Or bump = damage on a ship that cant avoid bumping for a couple rounds....

I feel like this is the case, but realistically, it's just perceptual bias lol.

I still go out of my way to duck crits though, because of how easily a bad crit can screw up a good strategy. Usually if I'm just taking hull, even on low hull ships, I'll let it through if it means keeping a focus for attack, but if it's a crit, I'm spending it. Better that than Blind or Weapons Failure or PS0 or... etc.