50 minutes ago, X Wing Nut said:

I see a lot of new players experience disappoint when they pick up the game and find out that those big beautiful ship from the movies are not competitive to play and if they want to win

A very unfortunate--and very strange--impression, given that, for example, 64% of total W5 Imperial Regionals fleets contained an ISD, but 75% of top 4 Imperials did--a skew of +18% . In fact, there is strong evidence that the flotillas saved the large ships, which are now performing almost exactly on par with their frequency of occurrence .

8 minutes ago, Ardaedhel said:

A very unfortunate--and very strange--impression, given that, for example, 64% of total W5 Imperial Regionals fleets contained an ISD, but 75% of top 4 Imperials did--a skew of +18% . In fact, there is strong evidence that the flotillas saved the large ships, which are now performing almost exactly on par with their frequency of occurrence .

Get outa here with your logic and facts.

29 minutes ago, Ardaedhel said:

A very unfortunate--and very strange--impression, given that, for example, 64% of total W5 Imperial Regionals fleets contained an ISD, but 75% of top 4 Imperials did--a skew of +18% . In fact, there is strong evidence that the flotillas saved the large ships, which are now performing almost exactly on par with their frequency of occurrence .

I completely agree that large ships are more viable, but it is only because players are leveraging multiple flotillas to play the activation game. What most are saying here in favor of the IA pass thing is it would be neat if that gameyness wasn't necessary.

2 hours ago, CaribbeanNinja said:

My biggest problem with changing the way activation works in Armada is...What would it do to objectives? I think that the objectives are such a big part of this game, that giving second player any more benefit (or just alternating initiative) would really destroy the current objective system. I don't think I'd be okay with that.

I'm currently in the camp of "Looks ominously at all the GR-75s out there but thinks the game is still in relatively good shape."

I can feel you there, alternating initiative would not be good. I honestly don't think that having last/first is necessary for first player to still be better than 2nd player, even with the objectives. First player dictates the terms of engagement, and what lives, what dies. First player still can move his or her big nasty up to smash stuff, just 2nd player gets to dictate what one ship gets a chance to move after, and perhaps shoot. The IA pass thing would just mean that 2nd player would never get last/firsted, which I think is probably the most frustrating part of the game, especially for new people. This is hardly a new thing, albeit I was in the "game is fine, Demo is fine" camp of things the first time this reared its ugly head. Every game I've had the most fun with lately has been the games where both players have had even activations.

let's be real guys, FFG doesn't want us to activate ships, it wants us to activate non-firing flotillas and squadrons (yes I'm trolling a bit, but I hate ISD/4 flotillas lists or its MC80 equivalent)

I am firmly in the camp of one of those "ISD + flotillas till the day ends" and will say there is NO WAY without flotillas I could be running the fleet I personally like to play and play well. Additionally, I both have less than the "acceptable" amount of 5 activations and each of my flotillas serves an essential and impossible to replace role in my fleet. Any sort of passing mechanic added would not alter my fleet at all.

Additionally, in the summer tournament I altered my fleet from gozanti squadron heavy to raider msu and did fairly well against rieekan aces. Far better than expected. It was a super close game, but I came out on top.

I just think to boils down to playstyle. I get why people want to pass, i get flotilla spam is boring, but I don't know if passing is the answer to that problem. I am really really torn as someone who has found their niche in this meta where I can have fun with every game, which wasn't the case before this wave when it was either the gencon special or then some variation on the Clonisher I was facing in every game.

I play against a wide variety of fleets, wider than I have ever seen. I am sorry if some metas get stuck on rieekan aces or flotilla spam and 8 of 10 guys play it week after week after week. That sucks. I just dont feel like the game in the broadest sense is in as bad of a place that it needs multiple "fix it threads" 5+ pages long and more created every day. It absolutely needs some tweaks, but this iteration of "broken" feels less broken than previous versions, even though the outrage is double the fury.

The only solution is this:

Every player must have exactly 4 ships.

Is that what you want? any of you?

7 minutes ago, Ginkapo said:

The only solution is this:

Every player must have exactly 4 ships.

Is that what you want? any of you?

where the hell was anything like this mentionned?

People just want less then "5-or-more activations" lists to be viable.

Just now, Sybreed said:

where the hell was anything like this mentionned?

People just want less then 5-or-more activations lists to be viable.

Thats not all they want, not really, they just havent realised yet.

This is the logical conclusion of this argument, I just jumped to the end for you all.

High activation fleets are a horrible part of the game!
Ok, so nerf by adding pass!
Large ship only fleets are a horrible part of the game!
Ok, so lets force people to have variation.

Ergo, the only way to eliminate activation is to force everyone to run the same number of ships.

Unfortunately most of the answers so far that have not advocated a core game change or what is effectively an equivalent in upgrades has been;

1. Nah, just use flotillas a lot and you can play with one single large ship

2. Nah, MSU will work, just play that.

3. But the large ship gets a much better activation than the many small ones.

4. We just plain like pushing small ships and flotillas around, no problem here (Which is fine, if that's your preference).

The entire point of most of these threads is that most want a game everyone can enjoy. Some people want to be able to play a medium heavy list or more than one large ship. Some people plain hate flotillas and the often present shuffling along one board edge as far away from fighting as possible they do. Even if you can build ships to kill them (inefficiently and never at a cost back) their mere ubiquitousness irk those people (me included). Flotillas, if intended as a fix to activation for large ships, was a really bad idea. People who watch games with flotilla shuffling goes "eh" and goes to do something else. It has zero Star Wars cinematic feel or flair. This last is obviously my personal opinion.

So change should aim to: increase viability of all list types, allowing lists that are not MSU or flotilla heavy to go toe to to with those lists. Doing so should not require a super specialised oddball build. Note, flotilla fleets and MSU should still be -just as viable- as any other fleet, so if you enjoy them they are no worse off. If you do not however, you should not be forced to take them or a narrow specific build to stand a chance.

MSU and flotillas are just way too good right now, so everyone uses them. A large ship does in fact not generally have a "higher quality" activation to match several smaller ships. One activation in an entire game might be strong, but meanwhile a trc-90 has been doing more damage than the ISD can on all turns except that one every turn since turn 2. Consistent 4-5 damage every shot from multiple sources every turn is crazy deadly, especially when the ISD does the same or lower with its one activation.

I would also point out that, RE: the pass rule giving too much to Player 2, a list like mine or Ard's can go 2nd and outactivate some lists by three, so in that instance the pass rule would actually help 1st player.

3 minutes ago, Ginkapo said:

Thats not all they want, not really, they just havent realised yet.

This is the logical conclusion of this argument, I just jumped to the end for you all.

High activation fleets are a horrible part of the game!
Ok, so nerf by adding pass!
Large ship only fleets are a horrible part of the game!
Ok, so lets force people to have variation.

Ergo, the only way to eliminate activation is to force everyone to run the same number of ships.

I still disagree, but what we currently have is the obligation to run 5+ lists, so is there any difference really?

Maybe if FFG releases another ship that costs 10 points, we won't have this flotilla spam anymore...

Hey look, I fixed the problem. FFG hire me.

Another solution:

A flotilla can only be activated before a friendly Small, Medium or Large ship, if its at distance 1-5 of a Small, Medium or Large ship.

This forces flotillas to be closer to the action, if you want to activate them before your other main combat ships. And maybe it will kill of the tendency for some to use a flotilla as an Admiral lifeboat.

11 minutes ago, Sybreed said:

I still disagree, but what we currently have is the obligation to run 5+ lists, so is there any difference really?

Because its not a rule of law, so you at least have the option . The choice .

You currently retain the freedom to decide wether its an option to with to pursue or not. Wether you follow, or wether you search ways to break the mould.

Once its mandated, its mandated , and you have lost that freedom of choice.

Philosophically, having the choice is very important - even if you choose to follow the group - you at least have that choice .

3 minutes ago, Drasnighta said:

Because its not a rule of law, so you at least have the option . The choice .

You currently retain the freedom to decide wether its an option to with to pursue or not. Wether you follow, or wether you search ways to break the mould.

Once its mandated, its mandated , and you have lost that freedom of choice.

Philosophically, having the choice is very important - even if you choose to follow the group - you at least have that choice .

following World's logic, that's the choice of doing well vs losing your matches. What I'm advocating for is to really give people the option and still be rewarded for it.

Just now, Sybreed said:

following World's logic, that's the choice of doing well vs losing your matches. What I'm advocating for is to really give people the option and still be rewarded for it.

Not really.

Most people are advocating for only their position. No position needs to be penalised. And I've seen plenty of arguments for systems which enhances one specific way for the game to be played - but that is going to be at the expense of someone elses. What if someone likes and enjoys the 5+ activation play - you're now taking it from them - even if they had nothing to do with what happened at Worlds - even if they don't play it all that well - even if they do play it well and give it a right good go for their opponents. What right do we have to take that option from them by focusing on smaller activation plays?

Its the main reason why I havn't really lobbed in with a specific rules amendment to "fix" this situation...

Because I feel its mostly impossible to do so simplistically and in a straightforward manner.

Again, part of that is there is no one single specific problem identified. I can count 5 or 6 separate "problems" being rattled off at the moment, all trying to be given the same amount of headspace and "nerf-talk"...

So yes. Impossible to "fix" in a simplistic and straightforward manner.

At least, its well outside of my expertise in games design, anyway... All I really feel is we can be presented with more options , and then find ways to incentivise people to take those options. But while #WinningIsEverything, that's harder to do without artificially skewing the game as well. I mean, I personally can't see most of the issues as presented as problems... Because I'm not involved in the areas where there are problems.

Maybe someone will take it to the Sentry Box Store championships and pants everyone.

Maybe that will happen.

I highly doubt it though, because the problem here has already self-corrected - they'll be that-guy, after all...

As a group, we value creativity in our list builds - because we're one-upping each other.

30 minutes ago, Sybreed said:

I still disagree, but what we currently have is the obligation to run 5+ lists, so is there any difference really?

Excluding Rieekan, (since it's widely believed that Rieekan aces are overpowered):

4 ship lists are competitive within the margin of error (104/20/27) vs all lists (218/43/55).

Number strings are (# of Regionals lists meeting a criteria/ # of Top 4 finishers/# of Bottom Quarter finishers). Since Top 4 & bottom quarter aren't mirror images of each other, don't expect the numbers to be equal for balanced lists. (100/20/25) would be balanced proportionally.

2 & 3 ship lists are not (47/4/18).

4 ship lists are also the most common. For 4 ship lists, 1 flotilla is the wrong number (44/6/14). Zero flotillas is competitive, but rare (11/2/3). 2+2 fleets are competitive & common (46/9/10)

Squadrons have an effect, but not a simple one. Some combos of ships/Flots work well with squads, and some combos don't. 2+2 is better low squad for example: (20/6/3 vs 26/3/7)

1 minute ago, Baltanok said:

Excluding Rieekan, (since it's widely believed that Rieekan aces are overpowered):

4 ship lists are competitive within the margin of error (104/20/27) vs all lists (218/43/55).

Number strings are (# of Regionals lists meeting a criteria/ # of Top 4 finishers/# of Bottom Quarter finishers). Since Top 4 & bottom quarter aren't mirror images of each other, don't expect the numbers to be equal for balanced lists. (100/20/25) would be balanced proportionally.

2 & 3 ship lists are not (47/4/18).

4 ship lists are also the most common. For 4 ship lists, 1 flotilla is the wrong number (44/6/14). Zero flotillas is competitive, but rare (11/2/3). 2+2 fleets are competitive & common (46/9/10)

Squadrons have an effect, but not a simple one. Some combos of ships/Flots work well with squads, and some combos don't. 2+2 is better low squad for example: (20/6/3 vs 26/3/7)

wow, thank you for these numbers!

How about scaling the costs of Flotillas on how many your including in your list? The first one is the base amount but the second one will cost you 1.25x the base cost then 1.5x and so on and so on.

14 minutes ago, ripper998 said:

How about scaling the costs of Flotillas on how many your including in your list? The first one is the base amount but the second one will cost you 1.25x the base cost then 1.5x and so on and so on.

That's really hard to figure out mid game/easily building, and what does this solve, though?

15 minutes ago, ripper998 said:

How about scaling the costs of Flotillas on how many your including in your list? The first one is the base amount but the second one will cost you 1.25x the base cost then 1.5x and so on and so on.

way too complicated

Well I guess FFG are dealing with it another way.... see disposable capacitors

Maybe the Big ships need 3 attacks?

2 hours ago, slasher956 said:

Well I guess FFG are dealing with it another way.... see disposable capacitors

it deals with flotillas but that's about it...

14 minutes ago, ouzel said:

Maybe the Big ships need 3 attacks?

No. No they do not. Because Advanced Gunnery and Ackbar exist.