To double down on that, we also run fighter builds. Max fighter builds. Copycat iterations of the Utah list. And we win with them. =). A lot. Wipe people completely out. Win tournaments and make noobies cry. (Haha, untrue cuz there are no noobies left).

Also, of useful, helpful information to play against these, I don't recall ever getting any form you that couldn't be easily rebutted in short order.

With all due respect Blail, no one cares that you regularly lose either

17 minutes ago, Ginkapo said:

With all due respect Blail, no one cares that you regularly lose either

I guess that's probably alright. To be honest.

Also, he could discuss strategically, instead of snide retorts to a data-documented issue. He's free to post whatever he wants, but I'll be darned if its okay to imply people suck at playing the game as a way to avoid responding to points on the subject. Sure sounds like a bully to me.

The only person I implied that sucks at playing was myself

Because, y'know, Statistically Abysmal and all.

So, please, keep the bully call away, please. Its the third time you've done so.

When I want to insult you, I'll call you names. Simple as that.

I mean, I was oging to add this when I had time to write it... Because I do take some issues with some of your statements on a certain level. And I'll explain:

For one, Anecdotal is Anecdotal. What I presented is anecdotal. Regrettably, in the scheme of things, what else has been presented is also Anecdotal. Just because Evidence is Documented, does not stop it from being anecdotal. Its a good first step, for sure - but what makes evidence scientific instead of merely anecdotal is the framework in which it is collected. The old catch-cry of "Define your Variables."

I'll attempt to assist for this - even though, for what I have below, this is completely anecdotal. It cannot be peer-reviewed, and it accounts on only my singular viewpoint for "evidence"... But if that is enough, that is enough, and here it is:

For quite some time, I was running a standard fighter setup... 5X, 5Y, Jan. 134 Points. Mix of Escort and Bomber. Generally, I had a carrier fleet to launch most of them with 2-3 commands.

Tournament 1:

Game 1:
- Outbid by Imperial Carrier Force. 2x ISD and 2x GR-75
Loss by Points.

Game 2:
- Outbid by DeMSU
Loss by Points. Demo Triple-Tap Loss.

Game 3:
Outbid by TripleAckbar Frigates.
Loss by Wipeout. Unable to Carry damage through fighter screen.

Tournament 2:

Game 1:
Outbid Opponent (yay!)
Double MC80 Pickle List. Loss by failing ot drop last hull point on second MC80. Comparable fighter wings.

Game 2:
Ackbar 'Vette MSU
I have repressed this game. I think I rolled dice from bombers on 4 occasions and got nada. 4 A-Wings on his side did work otherwise.

Game 3:
- I missed notes on this one. Sincere apologies.

Tournament 3:

Game 1:
vs 5 Ship Imp List. Outbid. But strangely he took superior positions and I "won" despite losing all but one ship, by racking up 19 Superior Positions tokens.... He did manage to kill every one of my fighters by landing a n Instigator Raider on Debris, going to Speed 1, and then just shooting the 1 dice at them, while they were impotently unable to fire back or move... DemoGladII then came in and helped finish them off.

Game 2:
MC80, Frigate, GR75, GR75, Jamming Field.
I had a Jamming Field already. Won by keeping my Jamming Field in the back field and not dying. Everything else died.

Game 3:
Lost to a virtual mirror list. His Carriers were able to do more work on my Carriers than I could do back. Also, his choice of A-Wings instead of X-Wings really seemed to pay off for more overall dice being thrown back at me.

Regionals (which are far less scientific, as I mixed up)
- Switched to Sato. Took Norra, 3 Ys, 2 Zs, an X, a HWK and a VCX

Game 1:
ISD - Interdictor - GR75 list. 10x Regular TIE Fighters.
Took 6 turns to burn down the Regenerating ISD (Wulff, Eng + Shields from 'Dictor)
Won by 14 points in the end. Mostly by killing his GR75 and trading on fighters.

Game 2:
Vs Skycake and the list he took to the World Cup.
Only won by running away with the Capture the VIP objective and trying to dastardly hold back his Firesprays.
Won by 7 points

Game 3:
ISD / Interdictor / Arq-Arq.
Minimal fighter cover (4 Defenders)
Game Loss. Defenders are my bane. Couldn't kill them, couldn't get past them, couldn't deal damage to more than the ISD on the first turn with bombers, because it was able to speed away and have a Defender ready to catch me both at start of move and end of move.
Loss by 100 points.

So, what do I have to add to it? it,. being the discussion:

In my experiences, as anecdotal and/or scientific as you wish to pull it... I face a lot of high-squadron lists... Some are exclusively Bombers + Escorts, some are exclusively Interceptor/A-Wings.

I also face a lot of low-fighter MSU lists. And well piloted, they all vex me fairly equally... I find my own bombing lists are telegraphed rather heavily, and even when I've experimented with Yavaris/FC/FCT and B-Wings, I'm putting eggs in 1 basket that can't swiftly react elsewhere. They can (and do) chew through anything and everything put in front of them, but the trouble is getting more than 1 thing there, or reacting quickly to a shift on the battlefield elsewhere.

Do I consider this "bad" for the game? No. I tend to not ascribe to sensationalism on one side or the other, and see how things evolve. Because the hardest thing is defining what we have as a "meta" without being attached to our local environment and conditions.

And Clearly, beyond that. I'm *not* free to post what I like, if posting is going to have be accused of being a Bully. Multiple times.

So please, take anything you want from this. Because I figure this is the last time I'll be replying to any of your statements in the future. I am very sorry that we cannot communicate effectively, and I am sure that is my fault for being an alternating mix of sincere, helpful and dreadfully sarcastic. Truly, I am sorry.

54 minutes ago, Ginkapo said:

With all due respect Blail, no one cares that you regularly lose either

42 minutes ago, Blail Blerg said:

Also, he could discuss strategically, instead of snide retorts to a data-documented issue. He's free to post whatever he wants, but I'll be darned if its okay to imply people suck at playing the game as a way to avoid responding to points on the subject. Sure sounds like a bully to me.

I thought it was obvious that Dras was attempting to just add a silly comment at his own expense, as he's got a poor win rate.

If we're going to get into a "whoever is most offended wins" contest, I take offense at the accusation that Dras, who is nothing but helpful and a bit silly, is a bully. I take offense at the fact that whenever squadrons are being discussed, you show up to grab the spotlight and complain repeatedly about it until everyone else leaves. I take offense at the fact that your inability to defeat squadron-heavier fleets is treated as an objective fact that all of us should be very concerned about and treat with the utmost concern, bordering on hysteria, but those who don't experience the same problem are treated as people simply relaying anecdotes in an attempt to bully and diminish you. I take offense at you appointing yourself the great defender of objective data when you use only the interpretation that favors your agenda.*

*For example, if we approach the Regionals data from the perspective of looking at averages from the top 50% of fleets or even the top 4 (all of these being fleets that clearly did better than average), we see the fleets being run there average out to 6 squadrons. That's average. Some will be bomber-heavy fleets with more, some will be minimal fighter fleets with less. But in general the more data sources you have, the more significant your findings when it comes to any kind of average and so the larger your grouping the better your averages. Anyways, you insist on using the averages from the event winners only because it is the most alarmist and thus coincides with your agenda the most strongly. That is an average of 6 squadrons for winning Rebel fleets and 8 for winning Imperial fleets, for a combined average of 6.67. It is important to stress that as of right now, this is from nine total fleets. The Imperial winners represent THREE fleets. Drawing a conclusion about a meta problem for a game that is played by hundreds of people from 9 total data points is iffy. But you don't qualify it, and in fact you exaggerate it to use only the most alarmist portion of that alarmist and statistically questionable data by claiming fleets need to have 8+ squadrons or "maxing out squadron points" because of the average of a subset of a subset of data that comes from three fleets.

As an aside and out of interest, what does/did the "Utah" list consist of?

30 minutes ago, Snipafist said:

I thought it was obvious that Dras was attempting to just add a silly comment at his own expense, as he's got a poor win rate.

If we're going to get into a "whoever is most offended wins" contest, I take offense at the accusation that Dras, who is nothing but helpful and a bit silly, is a bully. I take offense at the fact that whenever squadrons are being discussed, you show up to grab the spotlight and complain repeatedly about it until everyone else leaves. I take offense at the fact that your inability to defeat squadron-heavier fleets is treated as an objective fact that all of us should be very concerned about and treat with the utmost concern, bordering on hysteria, but those who don't experience the same problem are treated as people simply relaying anecdotes in an attempt to bully and diminish you. I take offense at you appointing yourself the great defender of objective data when you use only the interpretation that favors your agenda.*

*For example, if we approach the Regionals data from the perspective of looking at averages from the top 50% of fleets or even the top 4 (all of these being fleets that clearly did better than average), we see the fleets being run there average out to 6 squadrons. That's average. Some will be bomber-heavy fleets with more, some will be minimal fighter fleets with less. But in general the more data sources you have, the more significant your findings when it comes to any kind of average and so the larger your grouping the better your averages. Anyways, you insist on using the averages from the event winners only because it is the most alarmist and thus coincides with your agenda the most strongly. That is an average of 6 squadrons for winning Rebel fleets and 8 for winning Imperial fleets, for a combined average of 6.67. It is important to stress that as of right now, this is from nine total fleets. The Imperial winners represent THREE fleets. Drawing a conclusion about a meta problem for a game that is played by hundreds of people from 9 total data points is iffy. But you don't qualify it, and in fact you exaggerate it to use only the most alarmist portion of that alarmist and statistically questionable data by claiming fleets need to have 8+ squadrons or "maxing out squadron points" because of the average of a subset of a subset of data that comes from three fleets.

Actually, my assertions from wave34 seasons12 were all about top16 top8 into top4 also. And my assertions of wave5 at the time were similar, as I kept repeating even use of top4 at the time. So I mean, hey, I covered that already. I also made a big talk about trends all thew ay through top16 top8 top4 and winners in wave34, which were a much higher number of lists. And I pointed out a bunch of objective data which no one cared to respond to, so, I mean, take me to town on the statistics, but low sample size has already been discussed.

Considering each time ships vs squadrons comes up the humor is derisive and ship-focused players don't have a reason to complain, people are going to notice that you have a very negative insinuation of people's skills level.

1 hour ago, Blail Blerg said:

4 hours ago, Megatronrex said:

I tried to tell a friend of mine this on Sunday when he brought exactly that against my fighter/bomber swarm. Instead he trickled them in one or two at a time and only killed Tempest Squadron.

1 hour ago, Blail Blerg said:

This is actually an issue of min-max list building, things like Toryn, Flight Controllers gain the highest benefit the more squadrons you get. 6 Zs will die extremely quickly, many times in one shot to a Toryn-helped generic or an Ace. Also, the Zs cannot realistically provide more than 1 turn of delay: Yavaris double taps will wipe two Zs off for one activation out of 10 of their squadrons, and then you cannot stop the first strike bombing, which again, realistically can deal out to 8-12 damage off of only one ship commanding. If you push the Zs forward, a good opponent holds his squadrons close so that your first strike will land you inside the AA from Yavaris and the Pelta, at which point, 3 health on many squadrons is like machete-ing through tissue paper. At that point you could literally wipe out all 6 Zs with Yavaris AA and maybe 2 squadrons, allowing you 8 others, including bombers to being a first strike, usually capable of crippling larges/mediums or totally deleting a small ship.

Here are the things that are implied about how to easily defeat this type of threat.

2 hours ago, Norsehound said:

"Oh, you need xyz and fly aggressively" solutions are... well... not helpful. Have you guys flown against defensive max fighter builds? As in, I hide in my corner/camp the points after choosing second player until you get into range and I wallop you with Yavaris bombers and all the buffs I sprinkled on my light ships? It's very tough to beat, very annoying, and It's irritating that this list type isn't more prominently faced in the meta for people to be concerned about it. Seems like the rest of the universe never bothers to try max rebel fighter bombers with Rieekan and aces.

Here's some more points that are handily not talked about.

39 minutes ago, Drasnighta said:

Because, y'know, Statistically Abysmal and all.

Not in this game (as much), but in other games, this is always me.

I... I thought I was the only one!

If people are asserting that squads (and specifically mythics fleet) are too strong, let's decide some testing methods and alternate hypotheses:

1. Mythic's is a strong, easy-to-play fleet.

Test: similar fleets are overrepresented at the top tables, and underrepresented at the bottom tables.

This should be especially testable over the next month, as people try to copy it.

2.top table players shift towards mythic-like fleets.

Test: difficult, as the regionals data doesn't track people from year to year.

3. Mythic is just that good.

Test: nothing statistical, as we can't fly mythic out to play against every regionals winner in the world. (Unless you have more money than sense) But try to play against him, and swap fleets. See how he defeats his own fleet, if he's willing.

From the regional thread:

Quote

1st - Drew Krumel - 396
1 • Modified Pelta-class Command Ship - Adar Tallon - Toryn Farr - Fighter Coordination Team - Boosted Comms - Phoenix Home (87)
2 • Nebulon-B Escort Frigate - Flight Commander - Fighter Coordination Team - Yavaris (68)
3 • GR-75 Medium Transports - General Rieekan - Comms Net (50)
4 • GR-75 Medium Transports - Ahsoka Tano - Bomber Command Center (28)
5 • GR-75 Medium Transports - Bomber Command Center - Boosted Comms (30)
6 • Wedge Antilles X-wing Squadron (19)
7 • Jan Ors Moldy Crow (19)
8 • Shara Bey A-wing Squadron (17)
9 • Norra Wexley Y-wing Squadron (17)
10 • B-wing Squadron (14)
11 • B-wing Squadron (14)
12 • B-wing Squadron (14)
13 • Gold Squadron Y-wing Squadron (12)
14 • Z-95 Headhunter Squadron (7)
15 • Objectives - Most Wanted - Fighter Ambush - Solar Corona (0)

Mythics offered some writeups about how he runs this list. But I've played against and proxied it enough times that I think I have an idea of how it works.

Let me highlight a few things in this list. First, it's a 396 bid, which is good against most casual lists. Typically Drew assesses his opponent, then decides whether he wants to get the jump on any ambush ships like Demolisher (to go first), or if he wants the points/deployment advantages of the objective and go second. In most games, Mythics decides to go second. He can easily squeak out some more points if he needs it, starting with the Z-95.

Second point, there are two BCCs here, though I've seen him deploy with three in previous iterations. Toryn Farr provides another source for bomber re-rolls, allowing each B-Wing die three roll opportunities, four on the blue with Toryn. This allows Drew to bowl for maximum damage and/or look for accuracy when shooting up flotillas. In playing against this and practicing with a similar archetype, I've been able to almost guarantee 2-3 damage with each bomber attack. Yavaris, of course, allows up to 6 attacks against the same target, in addition to Yavaris' attack against the target ship.

Third is fighter squadron composition. The core of this list are the B-Wings and Norra. When all three B-Wings attack a target, they have done 9 points of damage, not including the 3 shield points stripped off whenever they deal crits because Norra will, of course, be right next to them. With Yavaris powering those B-Wings the damage can increase to 18 damage, with Norra 6 shield points stripped off the target. Bear in mind, all of this is in individual damage clusters of at most 3 points, quickly depleting defense tokens before cutting into hull. Of course, the B-Wings are also pretty good at attacking fighters and Toryn far can support them. Previous iterations ran a bunch of generic X-Wings for fighter protection.

I don't need to explain out why Yavaris is good, but I will point out that Drew has a large choice in which squadrons he wants to double tap. If there are fighters coming in, he'll use Wedge, Shara, or the B-Wings. Once the fighters are clear, he'll tap with his B-Wings to get maximum damage against a single ship out of it. Since it's an escort, it also pumps two blue dice of fire into whatever his squadrons are engaging.

Jan Ors isn't only a zombie ace, but she guarantees that those bombers can engage capital ships of their choice, or just shuffle around squadrons for ideal positioning, in addition to allowing those brace tokens. Wedge is there to act in response to any rush attempts... he's often the subject of Yavaris after an attack cloud moves in, allowing him two attacks with 6 blue dice + a re-roll at two different activated targets (sometimes even fighters that rushed in to kill him). I've also seen Jan being used to move in and lock down squadrons, because like Shara she has counter 2 to take some squadrons with her.

Shara Bey and the Z-95 are there to delay attacking fighters. If you're taking a minimal squadron or skimp on intel, Shara can lock down your entire ball for the turn she engages... or longer if you don't kill her. The Z is also there to lock down squadrons and not much else. You'll have to deal with Shara's Counter 3 whittling down your squadrons, which will also have to press on and face the rest of Mythic's fighters. I remind you, this includes Wedge ready to attack any activated squadrons, tanky Golds, counter2 Jan, and B-Wings which are tanky and throw three dice. Escort Frigate Yavaris is sitting behind them. Whatever you send against Shara may not want to face all of that. You'll want intel to get away from her, if you paid the points to take it, and if Shara doesn't destroy it on her way in.

This list likes to deploy in a defensive fashion. Typically it will either deploy on the station to give all the fighters there passive healing bonuses/cover, or with the number of deployments, he'll decoy you into deploying a heavy asset out of position and deploy the rest of his forces elsewhere to mitigate what he's facing. If you go after the 1-2 GR-75s he deploys first, he's only missing a small amount of points while he does the objective or hits you out of position. Other objectives play to this as well, Most Wanted is to help him cut down your biggest ship with the Pelta/Yavaris. Fighter Ambush is only for the points he gets when his bombers engage, which will happen if you're dumb enough not to take the fighter threat seriously. Solar Corona not only protects his ships, but acts as a Superior Positions advantage of placing where he will in relation to you.

When I've faced him, Mythics isn't afraid to drop and stay at speed 0 on his edge of the board. He'll then move his fighters into long range, allowing the GR-75s and Pelta to command all of them from a safe distance while passing the Yavaris a navigation token. He'll do this to make you waste a few turns crossing the board... He's tried this out, Demolisher? with engine techs cannot reach Yavaris in a couple of turns worth of movement. His force projection allows him to attack and destroy capital ships just as they're entering long range (or before) of his own capital ships, whereupon he starts moving if he has to. Yavaris can also stay at long range as well, since Flight commander allows the ship to activate at his new medium range, and the Fighter Coordination Teams allows his squads about to be activated by Yavaris, to move.

Against rush lists, not only would this fighter barrier respond to any obvious incoming forces and then annihilate them in Yavaris-fueled bomber fire, but he can use his GR-75s as zombie-Rieekan flotilla blockers to prevent something like Demolisher from getting the killing blow on the Yavaris otherwise. As well, aside from the Yavaris power activation, the rest of his list can function with the multiple fighter-2s that it gets out of the GR-75s that not only help with the deploy/activation advantage, but also multiply the buffs in his fighter groups. Even if Yavaris is dead, the Pelta can pick up the slack by activating quantity.

Sure, the list has weaknesses, like how all those ships are small bases and how most of them can die if you generate accuracy to really hurt them. But the point is to focus the lists' entire hitting power on squadrons, which in my view, are the most difficult unit to destroy. So they enjoy the natural protection of being hard to remove from the field, allowing them longer times to do their jobs, and kill a target through attrition of low-damage attacks. I've seen that bomber cloud eliminate a fresh ISD in one or two turns. If it can remove the healthiest ship in the game that quickly, this is a list to be feared, and I'm a little stunned nobody is taking this list type more seriously.

-----

I've tried a lot of things against it, from stubbornly taking all capital ship lists throwing two dice with gunnery teams to assortment of Interceptor Aces, to a VT drop with Expanded Hangars to kick out five VTs and kill things. I still lose against them every time. Against this list, fighters are the only viable counter-option in my opinion. I have two recent ideas I haven't had a chance to try on the table yet against Drew.

The first is the VSD-ISD combination idea that I have flying 9 TIE Fighters boosted with Flight Controllers. The idea is to kamikazie the cheap fighters into the fighter ball to tie up or destroy the generics, then use my capital ship's hitting power to try knocking out the carriers before I lose all of my fighters. It's worked a couple of times in solo matches.

The next is a Fighter-6 supercarrier ISD with a large cadre of aces. The idea is to get a massive alpha strike to eliminate the generics and try to clear the field before the ISD gets into position and starts attacking. It's got everything from both Advanced aces to Dengar and a generic jumpmaster to Mauler Mithel.

Both of these options, especially the second, feel super tailored to fighting this list specifically. But against this list such extremes are necessary and it makes me wonder about the future of the game where fighters are super-dominant. That, or you play the game avoiding this list and taking super bids to play to your scoring objective. Kudos to Mythics for designing the list though, I think he's the best player in our local meta.

51 minutes ago, Norsehound said:

snip

Dang. Nice formatting. =)

51 minutes ago, Norsehound said:

I've seen that bomber cloud eliminate a fresh ISD in one or two turns. If it can remove the healthiest ship in the game that quickly, this is a list to be feared, and I'm a little stunned nobody is taking this list type more seriously.

yup. I saw it too. Fun and engaging mechanics.

Really, I wonder if the current squadron "problem" isn't just a manifestation of the core game design.

"Squadrons are a threat." + "Squadrons are the only [real] counter for Squadrons." = "Everyone Brings Squadrons [for offense or defense or both]".

If you go back to the earliest design and marketing articles for Armada, they made (make) it sound like everyone would be using squadrons, either because of their ability to "tear down even the most massive of capital ships" if left unchecked, or because "most fleets protect their ships by using screens of fighters to engage enemy squadrons."

If you want squadrons to be an effective strategic choice, and you want squadrons to be the only viable counter to squadrons, you're going to have to walk a pretty fine line. If people can "counter" them for significantly less than it costs to effectively run them, they won't really be viable. But if they cost so much to effectively counter that fleets are forced to choose between being able to deal with squadrons OR being able to deal with ships, you're setting up a weird rock-paper-scissors situation.

Uh. Anyways. How 'bout them TIE Phantoms?

Thanks for the post and explanation. I did see the thread run up a few weeks ago. And yes, its a good list. From the description, it is also played skillfully by a good player.

I'm honestly not sure we can create any kind of test that is not almost entirely anecdotal. After all, most local Armada communities are shaped by a handful of strong players, and what ends up being good depends partly on which faction and which units they've gravitated toward. I can't say we've got anyone locally that is playing that particular list, but we do have the runner-up from Worlds in our local meta and his main list running back to wave-2 is Rieekan Aces. Some of the squadrons overlap, and certainly Yavaris overlaps with Mythics list above, which is to say that the local community does have experiencing playing against lists like it.

Its a solid list. There's no denying that, and solid lists in part force us to design our lists with the knowledge that they may make an appearance. Some of the claims with respect to the list just seem bizarre. After all, there seems surprise that the list can remove a fresh ISD in 1-2 rounds. Nearly every list I've ever built has the potential to drop an ISD in 1-2 rounds. I won a tournament Saturday dropping an MC80 in a single round of shooting, and that's before I note that I also had a side-arc I didn't get to fire at it and could have rammed it twice. Getting to this level of damage is not hard and should be possible in any well-built list.

Dealing with that list as described really takes going to the board and seeing. It is pretty hard to talk in the abstract without actually playing moves on the board. There are some definitely good moves being played there, and a good player can generally sit down after a loss and come up with a different plan for dealing with the same list again, which is to say that regardless of who wins, a second game probably isn't turning out exactly the same.

I can walk back the ISD statement at least, I think it's just because I'm still in shock for a couple of reasons. The first is because it's been a while since I've had a lot of ship vs ship exchanges to know how often one-shots out of large ships, even against other large ships, is possible. Two, because death by a thousand cuts through mythics Yavaris list so many times just highlights how powerless even ISDs, and large ships by extension, feel.

And I agree that solutions are best found through pushing plastic on the table. There was a period where I constructed trial lists against Mythics' build in repeated solo matches, and when I thought I had a list I brought it against him only to have it crash pretty hard (it was a 2x VSD list with 2x GZs, Interceptor aces, VTs). What may be anecdotal or incidentals to others not connected to our Meta might seem abstract, and it's easy to deny Blail and I as alarmists for that, but at least in my case, Mythics is my only opponent. To ask him to not run that list feels like asking him to go easy on me, and it doesn't solve the problem I perceive of a list type that dominates all others with no easy counter. At least, no counter that something like an Empire list could use in an all-comers situation.

Since I'm an armada enthusiast I can't resist commenting though, and of course I'd want to bring up this list which I feel has no good solid counter at the moment. I'm sorry my frustration has been coloring my remarks.

5 hours ago, Norsehound said:

Really long, well-thought-out post.

So, I see a few things in here that just jump out to me, and I want to address those points, but first of all I want to emphasize that I really do empathize with you guys (I think I accidentally a rap line... italicize). For much of late W2/early WThor, Justin's Rieekan Ace-holes were dominating every tournament here, as well, and I was in pretty much the same position you guys are--against a very similar list. So please don't take my points as dismissive "git gud" rebuttals, but rather as they're intended: constructive criticism.

Quote

Both of these options, especially the second, feel super tailored to fighting this list specifically.

So, here is the core of your problem, I think.

Mythics' list will be very good against all-ship lists, but will crumble against well-played squadrons.

You're concerned with tailoring to beat this list, when, to me, it is clearly tailored to beat your playstyle. Probably not intentionally, btw: in a small closed meta like you describe, that will kind of just happen.

Let me show you what I mean with some points breakdowns:

Bombers: the list is obviously heavily invested in amplifying those bombers. 16 points in upgrades, 42 points in generics, 29 points in uniques (not counting Wedge here, even though he's technically a bomber) = 87 points directly toward bombing. But bombers on their own can't cut mustard, because they need...

Intel: this is straightforward, with Jan being the only 19 points in Intel. But like bombers, Intel on its own doesn't cut it either, because to keep the Intel alive you need either a devastating, fast, hard-hitting alpha strike, or you need...

Escort: he has one escort. When building out your escorts, there are two really important things to consider: survivability and area coverage. Wedge's survivability is unparalleled with Rieekan protecting him--but he's only one body, and cannot even come close to fully protecting Jan from an alpha strike by faster fighters. 19 points directly in escort.

The rest of his squadrons: Shara is fantastic, but as the only pinner, she's quickly neutralized by keeping your own intel in reserve just out of her range. And the Z is peanuts, whose points should've been spent on AFFM in this list.

That's a total of 71 (53%) bombers/19 (14%) intel/43 (32%) squadron defense.

That means he is extremely heavy on bombers, and light on squadron defense. Most of the time, in bomber builds, you'll see 30-40% bombers, with the rest spent on the "overhead" of intel and/or anti-squadron defense to make sure the bombers get through (I just grabbed a few of the top bomber lists by count in Shmitty's regionals data, and that data is consistent with this rule of thumb). A higher proportional investment in bombers means the player is comfortable enough in his ability to win--or not have to play--the squadron game that he's skimping on the squadron-defense overhead. This kind of build, because it is able to make more efficient use of bombers, is obviously much more punishing when it does win the squadron game, but it gambles heavily on not being outplayed by enemy antisquadron.

So, list analysis comes up with two possible weaknesses on the squadron-build side of the list are 1) Wedge's lack of escort coverage, and 2) the overall lack of investment in squadron defense.

The other important piece of the list is Rieekan's interaction with uniques. Uniques in bold:

Wedge (19)
Jan (19)
Shara (17)
Norra (17)
B-wing (14)
B-wing (14)
B-wing (14)
Gold (12)
Z-95 (7)

Wow, that's a lot of uniques! But you know what else jumps out at me when I look at that list? Let's look at where the majority of his anti-ship damage comes from...

Wedge (19)
Jan (19)
Shara (17)
Norra (17) (indirect through aura)
B-wing (14)
B-wing (14)
B-wing (14)
Gold (12)
Z-95 (7)

Do you see what I'm seeing? The B-wings are a major Center of Gravity for this list, and are unaffected by Rieekan. What's more, remember that first weakness we identified above? Lack of Escort coverage. I think we're seeing a Critical Vulnerability emerge: heavy reliance on vulnerable and inadequately-defended B-wings. How best to exploit that is kind of an open question, but Flight Controller Interceptors with Howlrunner are a very real thing.

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5 hours ago, Norsehound said:

it's a 396 bid

Then outbid him. Five points is not an unattainable bid.

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5 hours ago, Norsehound said:

the 3 shield points stripped off whenever they deal crits

If he's stripping more than 1, maybe 2 extra shields on one ship with Norra crits, either you're doing it wrong, or he is. Don't redirect the first attack that crits. Sure, it drops your shields in that zone. On subsequent attacks, either he 1) attacks the same zone, at which point you redirect to adjacent shields and don't take the extra shield damage anymore, or 2) attacks the adjacent hull zones, allowing you to bring the fourth hull zone's shields into play, which would otherwise not have been available. Either way, you win.

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5 hours ago, Norsehound said:

I've seen that bomber cloud eliminate a fresh ISD in one or two turns.

Given that he's spent his entire list on enabling it to do so, I don't think this is unreasonable.

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5 hours ago, Norsehound said:

five VTs

Don't take rogues to do an activated squadron's work. VT's, like all rogues, are super points-inefficient, especially for squadron-hunting. If you're carrying them to activate anyway, take either Interceptor/Howlrunner or an Aceball (I like Howlrunner/Valen/Soontir/Mauler/Dengar/Black).

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There were a few more points, and I might come back to them tomorrow, but it's getting late and this is already long enough as is. I hope I've been able to at least give you guys a few things to think about. Vergilius is ultimately right that this is a hard thing to answer in anything but sweeping generalizations without specific board-state examples, so if you guys want to document a game for feedback, I'm sure there are plenty of people here who, like me, would love to offer their unsolicited advice on what you could've done better.

The biggest overall issue I see, though, is what I brought up at the top: you guys really want to bring no squadrons to fight a list that's built specifically to punish squadronless opponents. You're just not going to find something like that that will succeed consistently against this. Nor should you: the mechanics behind encouraging diversity of builds means that some types of builds will be stronger or weaker against others. FFG chose to make Fighter Screen > All-in Bombers > Squadronless > Fighter Screen, generally speaking. If it were easy to reverse directions on one of those, it would lead to a dominance of that type of build.

Bring some fighter-killy fighters. Punish him for skimping on his fighter defense. Force him to invest points out of the bombers and into fighter defense. This is how you encourage diversification in list-building, and how you'll break yourselves out of the deadlock of having to face this every time you play.

Also, on a side note, and this is just my personal opinion and I don't hold it against Mythics specifically, but I think bringing the same thing over and over to casual games when you're completely dominating every time is kind of **** move. Sure, bring it enough to keep in practice. Sure, bring it to tourneys and such. But don't drive away the rest of your community by trashing them with the same thing every single Armada night.

16 hours ago, Blail Blerg said:

Dras, to be real, we really don't care that you lose playing them, its anecdotal, and almost unrelated information that really implies "you suck, play better". Also because you're playing totally differently from how this guy plays and how he thinks about the game, which can be found by the lack of specific similarities you tend to bring up. If that's not what you imply, I think here you'd need to be more clear. Otherwise, no one gives a soupy rats ass that you lose while playing squadrons. To be really honest, we also think even the other two copycat lists in the Utah Regional had no idea of the magnitude of potential that actually is generated from the winning list.

Do US all a favor and don't speak for US anymore. I, for one, don't like your "holier than thou" attitude when it comes to judging other players and their intentions. I "give a soupy rat's ass" about all posters on this forum that provide information and POSITIVE feedback on questions and opinions posted here. I also respect Dras, as well as a great majority of folks, who take their time to provide this community with information to help make a great game even better.

If I ever sat across from you and you had the gall to tell me "you suck, play better", I'd probably kindly quit, pack up my ships and go find a game with someone that respected their opponent more than you do.

16 hours ago, Blail Blerg said:

Dras, to be real, we really don't care that you lose playing them, its anecdotal, and almost unrelated information that really implies "you suck, play better". Also because you're playing totally differently from how this guy plays and how he thinks about the game, which can be found by the lack of specific similarities you tend to bring up. If that's not what you imply, I think here you'd need to be more clear. Otherwise, no one gives a soupy rats ass that you lose while playing squadrons. To be really honest, we also think even the other two copycat lists in the Utah Regional had no idea of the magnitude of potential that actually is generated from the winning list.

I for one care about any information Dras feels like sharing with this community. He's been one of if not the most helpful posters on this forum and I think it's bull how piss poorly he's being treated by a hand-full of pricks around here lately.

You suck, post better.

14 minutes ago, moodswing5537 said:

Do US all a favor and don't speak for US anymore. I, for one, don't like your "holier than thou" attitude when it comes to judging other players and their intentions. I "give a soupy rat's ass" about all posters on this forum that provide information and POSITIVE feedback on questions and opinions posted here. I also respect Dras, as well as a great majority of folks, who take their time to provide this community with information to help make a great game even better.

If I ever sat across from you and you had the gall to tell me "you suck, play better", I'd probably kindly quit, pack up my ships and go find a game with someone that respected their opponent more than you do.

You're nicer than I am. Nothing about my response would be able to be described as "kindly."

10 hours ago, Greatfrito said:

Really, I wonder if the current squadron "problem" isn't just a manifestation of the core game design.

"Squadrons are a threat." + "Squadrons are the only [real] counter for Squadrons." = "Everyone Brings Squadrons [for offense or defense or both]".

Armada is a good game because at least in my experience, the above sentiment is not true. You absolutely don't have to win the squadron game to win this game. You can kill 0 points in fighters and still get a full fleet kill. People tend to forget this. So in addition to taking you fighters, you can counter carrier builds by killing the carriers. Often times if you can do it effectively and quickly it's actually MORE efficient than trying to kill the fighters with some of your own. Additionally, you can counter carrier builds by playing certain objectives, slowing them down, etc. I'm not quoting you to call you out to say you are wrong or a "how dare you". I just want to highlight some of the normal thought processes that seem to pervade us as a motley sort of individuals .

I do think one of the problems that we are so used to talking about miniature games (and a lot of other things) in absolutes. I'm starting to find it worrisome that people are starting to take some game experiences as canon, absolute truths, or laws. It started to seem like any time someone starts to question or provide an alternative, it seems like many (I'm speaking very generally here) lash out.

1. Remember this is a game. 2. It's a good game because most of the time we aren't constrained to a certain build to be competitive.

21 hours ago, Gottmituns205 said:

The list was: isd 2, arq, raider with tau and flachette, 2 gsd 2 with gunnery teams and acm

He basically went speed 3, got in my face and out activated me, I had very poor dice rolls aswell.

It did teach me to appreciate the imperials more.

Did you play this match Monday night? I think I know the guy who you played... he texted me that list and said he beat a Sato list real quick. We discussed stuff... I may have special insight.

Double Post...

14 hours ago, Norsehound said:

snip

Why hasn't he added Dagger Squad to that list? Costs 1 more point so it's a 397 bid, but it's unique and is good against squads. I think that would make the list even more insufferable.

9 hours ago, Ardaedhel said:

lso, on a side note, and this is just my personal opinion and I don't hold it against Mythics specifically, but I think bringing the same thing over and over to casual games when you're completely dominating every time is kind of **** move. Sure, bring it enough to keep in practice. Sure, bring it to tourneys and such. But don't drive away the rest of your community by trashing them with the same thing every single Armada night

It's a solid list, but i saw nigh on exactly the same in many lists at regionals, and they were spread far and wide throughout the rankings.

That said, the way you tell it Norsehound, it does sound like this guy has practiced using it to a tee. Agree with Ardaedhel - he does this all the time at your casual game nights? Kinda sucks the fun out of it for all involved, himself included.

9 hours ago, Ardaedhel said:

Also, on a side note, and this is just my personal opinion and I don't hold it against Mythics specifically, but I think bringing the same thing over and over to casual games when you're completely dominating every time is kind of **** move. Sure, bring it enough to keep in practice. Sure, bring it to tourneys and such. But don't drive away the rest of your community by trashing them with the same thing every single Armada night.

I have to agree here as well. He shouldn't have to be asked to play a different list. It's just a decent thing to do. Plus, it's a lot more fun. Personally, I have a hard time playing the exact same list more than a couple times anyway, as I always want to try new things.

1 minute ago, Xindell said:

I have to agree here as well. He shouldn't have to be asked to play a different list. It's just a decent thing to do. Plus, it's a lot more fun. Personally, I have a hard time playing the exact same list more than a couple times anyway, as I always want to try new things.

Yeah there are so many lists I've built that have yet to see the table that I can't really bring the same one more than a couple of times before I have to switch it up.