Inspired by Beatty's post (https://community.fantasyflightgames.com/topic/239547-on-worlds-and-my-experience-with-squadrons/) that spawned a discussion about the lack of content regarding the strategy involved in Armada, I thought I'd finally bite the bullet and start writing about Armada like I've been planning for a while.

This first article discusses the PICK system. A system I've devised to try and emulate the things that high level Armada players do, and provide a framework that other players can implement to improve their own game play.

I'd love to generate a discussion, especially about something beyond why Armada is broken.

Look forward to seeing some responses!

https://intelsweep.wordpress.com/2017/01/23/pick-your-battles-a-thought-system-for-star-wars-armada/

This is really well done. Thanks for putting the work in to write it.

Great stuff here, good work!

Great article! Thanks for taking the time.

A+

Thanks for the initial quotation. Highly substantive. More thoughts when I actually get free time.

I spotted a different game-losing mistake on your example: he has a B-wing and a YT-2400 about to get bumped by an MC80 on the opening move of turn 1. Depending on the loadout on the Liberty (i.e., whether it has ET or not), this is going to be a much more significant drawback than the Liberty being on the far side of the board. The Home One can crank hard left and the Liberty bump to Speed 3/4 to reorient the fleet by turn 2, but those two squadrons are going to be out of position for the initial squadron engagement, and may never make it to the target zone at all.

Thank you for this article, I'll be repeating it in my head next game. I at least can pick (not PICK) the exact moment it all goes wrong - usually the moment I finish moving that one squadron or slot the maneuver tool in. I can tell you the exact three moments that nailed the coffin lid shut last game, small things too. I see it seconds too late, I'll pause for longer next time.

Thank you for a very enlightening read. The very first point, pausing, may seem so trivial, but mistakes can very easily be made in the heat of battle due to overconfidence. I will apply your concise strategy next time I head into a game

Excellent writeup!

Great article. The "pause" is so (maybe even the most) vital. Ive driven many a ship into asteroids by getting a little to keen + impulsive.

Very good read and especially the Keep Control part. So many times I have seen people throwaway a good strategy mid game because their opponent was holding off playing the defensive game bidding their time and they wanted action now.

I hope to see more and hope this isn't lost, it is a well written article and touches on the premise a good player will use. Though I have to ask, did you take chess classes back in school? Because this sounds like one of the teaching acronyms you would find in one. That is more of a compliment than it sounds, I swear.

Thank you for taking the time to write this up!

Copied and pdinted. Will read this before each turnament

Great writeup. As I was reading it, it appeared you have simultaneously developed a system to describe game-wide tactical techniques, as well as individual moment-to-moment thinking, an impressive feat. The first point that struck a chord in my head was your comment that the best players "know" their fleet. This was a lesson hammered home for me at this past Regional for Georgia as my fleet relied on sophisticated timing and a large number of moving parts, both ships and card effects. Knowing your fleet, s you elaborate under Pause, goes even more fundamental than knowing strengths and weaknesses, but to using your fleet and every tool you've brought to the table to maximum advantage.

Further along,I had several flashbacks throughout your article to the US Air Force dogfighting/decision making tool the OODA Loop. While the four OODA parts, Observe, Orient, Decide, Action/Assess, don't perfectly match your four of Pause, Identify, Counter, and Keep Control, I detect significant synergy. Using the OODA principles to further refine the actions in the Identify, Counter, and Keep Control stages individually is essentially how I try to operate on the table, though I could never have quite put it as eloquently as that.

Regarding Keep Control and Counter, I would add that in addition to how we on the form usually define the word initiative, you are describing what I define as strategic initiative, that is, controlling the flow of battle. I would further add in that successful fleets subscribe to one of two types of strategic initiative: reactive and active initiative. Active initiative fleets are built in such a way that they must be attacked or unseated. An example of such a fleet would be (to use an example from our Regional) an Ackbar fleet with two Assault Frigates and an MC80. The fleet deploys in such a way that the broadsides of the ships create a field of fire an attacker must cross to trade blows with the ships. Most bomber fleets are also active initiative fleets. Basically any fleet that is a strategic sledgehammer, regardless of how neatly it is flown, and forces the opponent to find a way to change the terms uses active initiative.

Reactive fleets on the other hand are ok not forcing the battle exactly their way. Instead they wait for the opponent to make a mistake, then radically change the terms of battle with a single stroke, swiping the rug out from under their fleet. The best example of this sort of play is actually a ship, Demolisher, when flown in a fleet with high activations. Demolisher and her companions wait patiently, before striking fast and hard to change the terms of battle. Reactive fleets fundamentally are built around one or more "plays" to disrupt the enemy plan and deliver him in disarray to defeat.

Obviously the best fleets utilize both reactive and active elements. A fighter screen constructed to defeat an active bomber wing can be reactive, even as the heavy warships it supports exert active board control. Demolisher can be flown be reactively, waiting for a mistake, and actively, seeking to control the board and inviting challenge. My go-to Wave 2 fleet was a hybrid, an Imperial class Star Destroyer with an accompanying space superiority wing sought active board control, while two Raiders with Assault Proton Torpedoes sat waiting to react to enemy movement (such as a hapless MC30 crit twice and rammed twice before ever firing a shot). I'm curious how other people view overall strategic initiative in terms of Armada, and how they incorporate that into their fleets and battleplans.

Inspired by Beatty's post (https://community.fantasyflightgames.com/topic/239547-on-worlds-and-my-experience-with-squadrons/) that spawned a discussion about the lack of content regarding the strategy involved in Armada, I thought I'd finally bite the bullet and start writing about Armada like I've been planning for a while.

This first article discusses the PICK system. A system I've devised to try and emulate the things that high level Armada players do, and provide a framework that other players can implement to improve their own game play.

I'd love to generate a discussion, especially about something beyond why Armada is broken.

Look forward to seeing some responses!

https://intelsweep.wordpress.com/2017/01/23/pick-your-battles-a-thought-system-for-star-wars-armada/

Good write up.

Just curious, but is this you?

The markings on the ISD are the same as in your article. Oddly enough, I just watched this video yesterday.

Very nicely written. Like others have said, pause is probably the best piece of advice. I have a tendency to get excited when things are working my way and then I start to forget things, like engineering tokens, or upgrades, or even to reveal a command...And those are the things that comeback and get you in the end.

I hope there are more posts in the future.

Inspired by Beatty's post (https://community.fantasyflightgames.com/topic/239547-on-worlds-and-my-experience-with-squadrons/) that spawned a discussion about the lack of content regarding the strategy involved in Armada, I thought I'd finally bite the bullet and start writing about Armada like I've been planning for a while.

This first article discusses the PICK system. A system I've devised to try and emulate the things that high level Armada players do, and provide a framework that other players can implement to improve their own game play.

I'd love to generate a discussion, especially about something beyond why Armada is broken.

Look forward to seeing some responses!

https://intelsweep.wordpress.com/2017/01/23/pick-your-battles-a-thought-system-for-star-wars-armada/

Good write up.

Just curious, but is this you?

snip

It is Luke! And I'm happy to say my CC deployment was featured I had never previously witnessed first hand such disunity and infighting within Rebel High Command, i think everyone was present to watch the game. Our plans to take Corellia are proceeding accordingly.

I spotted a different game-losing mistake on your example: he has a B-wing and a YT-2400 about to get bumped by an MC80 on the opening move of turn 1. Depending on the loadout on the Liberty (i.e., whether it has ET or not), this is going to be a much more significant drawback than the Liberty being on the far side of the board. The Home One can crank hard left and the Liberty bump to Speed 3/4 to reorient the fleet by turn 2, but those two squadrons are going to be out of position for the initial squadron engagement, and may never make it to the target zone at all.

If I recall all those squadrons were absolutely massacred, but you're right bumping turn 1 with such slow squadrons is a real killer that a lot of players don't think about.

Because it was CC the Liberty only had one upgrade and it wasn't Engine Techs. As it happened the two raiders and the flotilla charged forward at full speed. Both raiders slipped past without getting fired upon, but the flotilla was caught and destroyed. Even if the deployment hadn't been so high up on the board they could have had more time to swing in, but as it was the Raiders were just too quick.

Very good read and especially the Keep Control part. So many times I have seen people throwaway a good strategy mid game because their opponent was holding off playing the defensive game bidding their time and they wanted action now.

I hope to see more and hope this isn't lost, it is a well written article and touches on the premise a good player will use. Though I have to ask, did you take chess classes back in school? Because this sounds like one of the teaching acronyms you would find in one. That is more of a compliment than it sounds, I swear.

Haha while I played chess as a child with my grandfather and then at school I never did take any classes or learn any formal chess knowledge (sadly)! I'll take it as a compliment though. Thank you for inspiring this article with your post!

Great writeup. As I was reading it, it appeared you have simultaneously developed a system to describe game-wide tactical techniques, as well as individual moment-to-moment thinking, an impressive feat. The first point that struck a chord in my head was your comment that the best players "know" their fleet. This was a lesson hammered home for me at this past Regional for Georgia as my fleet relied on sophisticated timing and a large number of moving parts, both ships and card effects. Knowing your fleet, s you elaborate under Pause, goes even more fundamental than knowing strengths and weaknesses, but to using your fleet and every tool you've brought to the table to maximum advantage.

Further along,I had several flashbacks throughout your article to the US Air Force dogfighting/decision making tool the OODA Loop. While the four OODA parts, Observe, Orient, Decide, Action/Assess, don't perfectly match your four of Pause, Identify, Counter, and Keep Control, I detect significant synergy. Using the OODA principles to further refine the actions in the Identify, Counter, and Keep Control stages individually is essentially how I try to operate on the table, though I could never have quite put it as eloquently as that.

Regarding Keep Control and Counter, I would add that in addition to how we on the form usually define the word initiative, you are describing what I define as strategic initiative, that is, controlling the flow of battle. I would further add in that successful fleets subscribe to one of two types of strategic initiative: reactive and active initiative. Active initiative fleets are built in such a way that they must be attacked or unseated. An example of such a fleet would be (to use an example from our Regional) an Ackbar fleet with two Assault Frigates and an MC80. The fleet deploys in such a way that the broadsides of the ships create a field of fire an attacker must cross to trade blows with the ships. Most bomber fleets are also active initiative fleets. Basically any fleet that is a strategic sledgehammer, regardless of how neatly it is flown, and forces the opponent to find a way to change the terms uses active initiative.

Reactive fleets on the other hand are ok not forcing the battle exactly their way. Instead they wait for the opponent to make a mistake, then radically change the terms of battle with a single stroke, swiping the rug out from under their fleet. The best example of this sort of play is actually a ship, Demolisher, when flown in a fleet with high activations. Demolisher and her companions wait patiently, before striking fast and hard to change the terms of battle. Reactive fleets fundamentally are built around one or more "plays" to disrupt the enemy plan and deliver him in disarray to defeat.

Obviously the best fleets utilize both reactive and active elements. A fighter screen constructed to defeat an active bomber wing can be reactive, even as the heavy warships it supports exert active board control. Demolisher can be flown be reactively, waiting for a mistake, and actively, seeking to control the board and inviting challenge. My go-to Wave 2 fleet was a hybrid, an Imperial class Star Destroyer with an accompanying space superiority wing sought active board control, while two Raiders with Assault Proton Torpedoes sat waiting to react to enemy movement (such as a hapless MC30 crit twice and rammed twice before ever firing a shot). I'm curious how other people view overall strategic initiative in terms of Armada, and how they incorporate that into their fleets and battleplans.

Knowing your fleet in Armada is extremely important, this is not to say you can't just rock up with something on the day, but in my experience it helps so much.

Also don't be shocked if you see yourself getting quoted in a future article, the control of the ebb and flow of a battle is extremely important, and the idea of active and reactive initiative is something I'd like to explore further.

Inspired by Beatty's post (https://community.fantasyflightgames.com/topic/239547-on-worlds-and-my-experience-with-squadrons/) that spawned a discussion about the lack of content regarding the strategy involved in Armada, I thought I'd finally bite the bullet and start writing about Armada like I've been planning for a while.

This first article discusses the PICK system. A system I've devised to try and emulate the things that high level Armada players do, and provide a framework that other players can implement to improve their own game play.

I'd love to generate a discussion, especially about something beyond why Armada is broken.

Look forward to seeing some responses!

https://intelsweep.wordpress.com/2017/01/23/pick-your-battles-a-thought-system-for-star-wars-armada/

Good write up.

Just curious, but is this you?

The markings on the ISD are the same as in your article. Oddly enough, I just watched this video yesterday.

Yeah that's me! I'm Intel Officer Luke from over at the Master of the Fleet. Intel Sweep is going to be where I put up more indepth Armada discussion.

I spotted a different game-losing mistake on your example: he has a B-wing and a YT-2400 about to get bumped by an MC80 on the opening move of turn 1. Depending on the loadout on the Liberty (i.e., whether it has ET or not), this is going to be a much more significant drawback than the Liberty being on the far side of the board. The Home One can crank hard left and the Liberty bump to Speed 3/4 to reorient the fleet by turn 2, but those two squadrons are going to be out of position for the initial squadron engagement, and may never make it to the target zone at all.

If I recall all those squadrons were absolutely massacred, but you're right bumping turn 1 with such slow squadrons is a real killer that a lot of players don't think about.

Because it was CC the Liberty only had one upgrade and it wasn't Engine Techs. As it happened the two raiders and the flotilla charged forward at full speed. Both raiders slipped past without getting fired upon, but the flotilla was caught and destroyed. Even if the deployment hadn't been so high up on the board they could have had more time to swing in, but as it was the Raiders were just too quick.

Very good read and especially the Keep Control part. So many times I have seen people throwaway a good strategy mid game because their opponent was holding off playing the defensive game bidding their time and they wanted action now.

I hope to see more and hope this isn't lost, it is a well written article and touches on the premise a good player will use. Though I have to ask, did you take chess classes back in school? Because this sounds like one of the teaching acronyms you would find in one. That is more of a compliment than it sounds, I swear.

Haha while I played chess as a child with my grandfather and then at school I never did take any classes or learn any formal chess knowledge (sadly)! I'll take it as a compliment though. Thank you for inspiring this article with your post!

Great writeup. As I was reading it, it appeared you have simultaneously developed a system to describe game-wide tactical techniques, as well as individual moment-to-moment thinking, an impressive feat. The first point that struck a chord in my head was your comment that the best players "know" their fleet. This was a lesson hammered home for me at this past Regional for Georgia as my fleet relied on sophisticated timing and a large number of moving parts, both ships and card effects. Knowing your fleet, s you elaborate under Pause, goes even more fundamental than knowing strengths and weaknesses, but to using your fleet and every tool you've brought to the table to maximum advantage.

Further along,I had several flashbacks throughout your article to the US Air Force dogfighting/decision making tool the OODA Loop. While the four OODA parts, Observe, Orient, Decide, Action/Assess, don't perfectly match your four of Pause, Identify, Counter, and Keep Control, I detect significant synergy. Using the OODA principles to further refine the actions in the Identify, Counter, and Keep Control stages individually is essentially how I try to operate on the table, though I could never have quite put it as eloquently as that.

Regarding Keep Control and Counter, I would add that in addition to how we on the form usually define the word initiative, you are describing what I define as strategic initiative, that is, controlling the flow of battle. I would further add in that successful fleets subscribe to one of two types of strategic initiative: reactive and active initiative. Active initiative fleets are built in such a way that they must be attacked or unseated. An example of such a fleet would be (to use an example from our Regional) an Ackbar fleet with two Assault Frigates and an MC80. The fleet deploys in such a way that the broadsides of the ships create a field of fire an attacker must cross to trade blows with the ships. Most bomber fleets are also active initiative fleets. Basically any fleet that is a strategic sledgehammer, regardless of how neatly it is flown, and forces the opponent to find a way to change the terms uses active initiative.

Reactive fleets on the other hand are ok not forcing the battle exactly their way. Instead they wait for the opponent to make a mistake, then radically change the terms of battle with a single stroke, swiping the rug out from under their fleet. The best example of this sort of play is actually a ship, Demolisher, when flown in a fleet with high activations. Demolisher and her companions wait patiently, before striking fast and hard to change the terms of battle. Reactive fleets fundamentally are built around one or more "plays" to disrupt the enemy plan and deliver him in disarray to defeat.

Obviously the best fleets utilize both reactive and active elements. A fighter screen constructed to defeat an active bomber wing can be reactive, even as the heavy warships it supports exert active board control. Demolisher can be flown be reactively, waiting for a mistake, and actively, seeking to control the board and inviting challenge. My go-to Wave 2 fleet was a hybrid, an Imperial class Star Destroyer with an accompanying space superiority wing sought active board control, while two Raiders with Assault Proton Torpedoes sat waiting to react to enemy movement (such as a hapless MC30 crit twice and rammed twice before ever firing a shot). I'm curious how other people view overall strategic initiative in terms of Armada, and how they incorporate that into their fleets and battleplans.

Knowing your fleet in Armada is extremely important, this is not to say you can't just rock up with something on the day, but in my experience it helps so much.

Also don't be shocked if you see yourself getting quoted in a future article, the control of the ebb and flow of a battle is extremely important, and the idea of active and reactive initiative is something I'd like to explore further.

Inspired by Beatty's post (https://community.fantasyflightgames.com/topic/239547-on-worlds-and-my-experience-with-squadrons/) that spawned a discussion about the lack of content regarding the strategy involved in Armada, I thought I'd finally bite the bullet and start writing about Armada like I've been planning for a while.

This first article discusses the PICK system. A system I've devised to try and emulate the things that high level Armada players do, and provide a framework that other players can implement to improve their own game play.

I'd love to generate a discussion, especially about something beyond why Armada is broken.

Look forward to seeing some responses!

https://intelsweep.wordpress.com/2017/01/23/pick-your-battles-a-thought-system-for-star-wars-armada/

Good write up.

Just curious, but is this you?

The markings on the ISD are the same as in your article. Oddly enough, I just watched this video yesterday.

Yeah that's me! I'm Intel Officer Luke from over at the Master of the Fleet. Intel Sweep is going to be where I put up more indepth Armada discussion.

Good read. Thanks for sharing. Bookmarked for future reference and articles.

Keep it coming! I've bookmarked the site.

Keep Control is so important. Every aspect is but I feel as though many games are needlessly lost by failing to do this.

You all might know it as "greed".

Another writer I enjoy reading, David Grounds, gave a piece of advice I have never forgotten. "Never sacrifice a strategic plan for a tatical oppurtunity". Your example in Keep Control is a pefect example of this and I've done it against you in Wave 2.

You were first Player and moved a Raider up. I sent 4 bombers at it. It was left on 2 Hull. I switched target with my next fighters to attack something else before next turn to soften the next target up. A tactical oppurtunity. My various combinations of dice that I threw at the Raider, which i thought was surely enough to kill it, failed to do so. You went first and turned 90 degrees at speed 4, denying the kill, my chance to equalise activations and therefore the game spiralled out of control.

Keep Control. If the plan is working stick to it and see it through and don't get greedy!

However what compliates the matter is this. If you need to take a greedy oppurtunity for the win and if not even attempting a greedy gamble means you have no chance of hitting the result that you need for a win or your tournement life what are you going to do?

My god, so I was watching some YouTube battle reports and this PICK came to mind. Mind you these were beginners playing but man the Rebel players kept making the same beginner mistakes. They rushed too fast in to battle to engage the Imperial ships. But the Imperials almost always have the advantage when you do this. And they almost always broke formation and only one ship was able to engage at a time. These are the perfect examples of why you need to Slow the heck down and Look at the battle. They lost their games horribly because they were in a hurry to get the first shot off, but it cost them the game.

Slow the heck down, it doesn't matter who gets the First shot, it's who can get the most guns to bare. Stay in formation, do not pull away because you can do an extra die of damage. If a ship gets separated and in close to the enemy it's dead. So think before you fall victim to your own excitement and rush of blood.

Outstanding job duder. Very well thought out and written.

12 hours ago, Captain Weather said:

Haha while I played chess as a child with my grandfather and then at school I never did take any classes or learn any formal chess knowledge (sadly)! I'll take it as a compliment though. Thank you for inspiring this article with your post!

Also don't be shocked if you see yourself getting quoted in a future article, the control of the ebb and flow of a battle is extremely important, and the idea of active and reactive initiative is something I'd like to explore further.

Fascinating that you bring up that you are familiar with chess, because that's actually where I discovered my distinction between active and reactive initiative. Back when I was a freshman in high school (9th grade for those unfamiliar with the idiocy of American schooling naming conventions), I racked up a couple hundred games of chess with this one particular opponent. I'd estimate across those two or three hundred games, I won (I kept exacting count of these) five games, and two of those when the poor guy was sick. To add insult to injury, my opponent, let's call him John, opened the same way every time, with six-move-mate. While it had the side effect that I am now practically immune as a player to six-move-mate, it formed a very large part of my tactical and strategic habits that I still see when I play all sorts of strategic games, whether chess, Armada, or DotA.

The trick to playing John was the fact that six-move-mate gave him absolute active initiative control, because it put his queen in the middle of the board early, and he was a fantastic strategist. Because he dominated the center of the board, either with pieces or threats from pieces, he always was able to force me to adapt my plans to him, regardless of what of or how I accounted for him. I quickly discarded long-term planning, something I have never fully regained, because I was never able to make my plans work through his incessant assault, and focused on tactical counter-play, seeking to lure him into traps, or what I previously called reactive initiative.

In short, active initiative is a control of the board (Armada, chess, whatever you're playing) through your plan that is so powerful that it actually reaches out and forces the opponent to change his plan against his will. It is the same basic premise discussed when historians say that Adolf Hitler possessed strategic surprise when he attacked France through the Ardennes Forest, and again when he launched Operation Barbarossa. Those are brilliant examples of active initiative. In my experience, active initiative is very powerful if it is more adaptive than the changes a reactive player can throw at it, and that battles between two pure active initiative forces come down to raw exertions of will and power. Active initiative's weaknesses tend to be that it is rigid, and may have difficulty fighting on different terms than intended (when such battles can be forced by its opponent), and that it tends to rely on linchpins that while collectively powerful, are individually vulnerable. To return to the chess example. every time I beat John, I took his queen, his most used piece and the most powerful on the board, usually fairly early. Without that powerful piece, even if I traded him mine for it, his strategic patterns had degraded to the point I could beat them.

Reactive initiative's weakness is the opposite. If it is not sufficiently aggressive or maneuverable, it will cede the general terms of battle to its opponent, something active initiative assumes/seizes by force. Reactive initiative is short and sometimes medium term planning, with a narrow, specific tactical or operational objective that may change on the fly. In chess, reactive initiative is defined, in my opinion, by the laying of traps, and the use of deceit to lure the opponent into making a mistake it can punish. This is not to say active initiative cannot use deception to its own ends, but that reactive initiative will often rely on it to make its victim make that critical mistake to exploit. Reactive initiative traps may but do not need to reach the same level of strategic depth as an active initiative plan. Where the trick with active initiative is to maintain resilience in the face of other active and reactive attacks on your plan, reactive initiative that finds itself rewarded may often struggle to fully capitalize on its newfound advantage, much to the expression about dogs not knowing what to do when they do catch a car.

That is all a very long way of me trying to give you another angle to approach strategic initiative if you choose to write any more on the subject. Hopefully this will be of some use to you.