During list building I often come to the point where I have to decide one big ship of two smaller ones and I tend to lean strongly towards Two smaller ships unless I want the eyecandy or have to take the bigger ship to access a special title like Home One.

So for the sake of argument lets say the total point cost should be the same. What are the advantages of both versions:

2 Small ships
* manoeuvrability
* number of attacks
* activations

1 Big ship
* quality of attacks
* upgrades more cost efficient
* more squadrons per activation

Now that does not look so bad but somehow I feel like armada's game mechanics amplify the small ship's advantages making them the clear better choice
in terms of in game performance. Big ships still look and feel cooler but I usually perform worse using them.
It feels nice to roll a lot of dice in those big attacks but either it gets braced (two smaller ones would have burned the brace if they brace both)
or it is overkill and I wasted half of my super attack because less damage would have done the same job.

So what can I do to make my large Ships perform better, do you have any hints?

1 hour ago, User1138 said:

During list building I often come to the point where I have to decide one big ship of two smaller ones and I tend to lean strongly towards Two smaller ships unless I want the eyecandy or have to take the bigger ship to access a special title like Home One.

So for the sake of argument lets say the total point cost should be the same. What are the advantages of both versions:

2 Small ships
* manoeuvrability
* number of attacks
* activations

1 Big ship
* quality of attacks
* upgrades more cost efficient
* more squadrons per activation

Now that does not look so bad but somehow I feel like armada's game mechanics amplify the small ship's advantages making them the clear better choice
in terms of in game performance. Big ships still look and feel cooler but I usually perform worse using them.
It feels nice to roll a lot of dice in those big attacks but either it gets braced (two smaller ones would have burned the brace if they brace both)
or it is overkill and I wasted half of my super attack because less damage would have done the same job.

So what can I do to make my large Ships perform better, do you have any hints?

I don't claim to be any good at playing, but personally I have always loved big ships, and opt for them by default most of the time. A big ship supported by small ships is very good. Either the big ship one-shots smaller ships (something I never consider a waste: a dead ship is a dead ship. If you killed it before it activated, even better), or softens up larger ships for the attacks of the smaller ships. Sure, 2 small ships could do something similar, but:

1) Small ships seldom 1 shot other ships, which I find particularly useful
2) Large ships soften up enemy ships faster, with a larger volley (and typically have greater chances of rolling an accuracy), and thus bring on the demise of the victim sooner

For example, I like ISD-IIs backed up by GSD-Is, or MC80H1s backed up by MC30cTFs. Alternatively, you can have the large ships backing up the smaller ships. Most people will probably see the choice between flying into a powerful front arc of a large ship as worse then heading towards 2 small ships, especially if they believe that they can one-shot one or both of the small ships. This allows the small ships to do their thing, which in my case typically involves landing 4 APTs (or trying to) on the target ship. At the same time, the large ship can now pop small ships or flank the enemy ship, which is no longer in a favorable position toward it. If the opponent decides to head for the big ship, believing it more of a threat, then you smaller, faster ships can now flank it, hitting it were it's weaker, or fly off to terrorize the ships that were hiding behind the biggie.

So what I am basically trying to say, rather poorly, is that I think a synergy is required. Big ships offer either the firepower support to weaken otherwise tough targets for the smaller ships, or can provide the finishing blow to those same targets, while smaller ships can harass at will. Large ships benefit from the smaller yet more numerous attacks of the small ships, which in turn benefit for the threat of the large volleys of the large ship, and the resulting popping of enemy small ships, or lost defense tokens. They're both good, both have value. If you want to use large ships, treat them as what they are: loads of dice. If you have small ships in your fleet, have those ships harass, finish off, or weaken the enemy (doesn't matter which), while the large ship performs the rest of the steps not performed by the small ship and closes off a decently large part of the board to the enemy through the threat of its main guns (while, again, not hesitating to use them on small-fry. Small-fry in that situation end up to be dead-fry, and that's the point of the game). Only small ships or only large ships can of course do basically the same thing, but I find the mix to be particularly helpful. With only small ships, you have no rallying point, no particularly heavy hitter, so the enemy doesn't have to chose between 1 big volley and several smaller ones, but merely on less small ships vs more small ships in a particular area. With only large ships, the opponent can either try avoiding one or can out-activate/out-flank/or out-fire the large ships, since it is typically rather difficult to fit enough large ships into a 400 point fleet.

I hope you managed to get through that with you sanity and logic intact. . .

Well, the rebel alliance had more and smaller ships, the Imps had waves and waves of ISDs (talking about films, no Kitties there) and we all know who won... Large ships need mostly a smaller screen, so that you can wait until the enemy small has activated and ended up surrounded, so ends the movement on the front of your ISD I for example. Smaller ships ultimately work to outflank and put big ships out of place. You need smaller ships OR an effective squadron screen to make the big boys shine

Bigger ships work just fine as long as you have a good fighter screen to take care of those smaller ships. For the Imperial side a couple of VSD work really well with fighters. The VSD control and relatively large area where the opponent will not enter into and the fighters can operate relatively free from enemy presence there. You can thus control where and engagement will occur. If you are lucky and you manage to engage the enemy fighter screen in front of your VSD then the Rebels are forced to stay in range of the VSD front cannons and that usually end in tragedy.

In general I think the big ship tactic work best for the Empire, the Rebels have better and more useful smaller ships in general.

3 hours ago, GhostofNobodyInParticular said:

So what I am basically trying to say, rather poorly, is that I think a synergy is required.

This.

In my opinion, large ships control area, small ships control tempo. The more small ships you have, the more you get out of your large ships.

4 hours ago, Baltanok said:

This.

In my opinion, large ships control area, small ships control tempo. The more small ships you have, the more you get out of your large ships.

Yup use the small ships to set up the big ships big hit,

It's a general trait of point-buy wargames that multiple small units have an advantage over fewer large units.

1) More units gives more fire opportunities
2) More units gives greater tactical flexibility
3) Smaller units mean less of a loss with each destroyed unit
4) Large units can only fire so many times in a game, limiting the ability to destroy small units

Unless the system for a game is created to mitigate many of these issues, you are generally better off with more, smaller units.

Whether Armada does a good job of minimizing the above advantages is an exercise for the reader.

The rough analysis of the regionals+nationals+worlds suggests that big ships in and of themselves are fine- The MC80s performed fine, and the ISD was actually very successful.

Where we do seem to have a problem is with lists that run nothing but large ships. ISD+2 VSDs, MC80H+2 AFm2, or 2x Large Ship seem to struggle against lists that pack 5+ activations. That's different from Big ships being bad- Doom Pickle+3 TRC carrying CR90s or an Imperial star destroyer with a support group are pretty good.

Exactly how this should be addressed? Well, we've got pages upon pages talking about this subject already, and there doesn't seem to be much in the way of consensus beyond perhaps "This is not ideal."