17 hours ago, Biophysical said:

In all seriousness, do you think it was more due to squad selection vs the meta or raw talent?

10 hours ago, Brunas said:

Nah, seriously, at least for me it's just practice. I don't even want to go back and think about how much playtime we put into specific match-ups that we were expecting. Fun fact: the FSR plan for corran is to not draw Nathan in the cut. Whoops! With the meta in flux as much is it is (was?) during Gencon, just having the sheer volumes of games that we did against what we correctly figured the meta would be was a massive advantage.

I've been wondering about the difference between good players and great players, and I guess that's the difference?...great players have play test groups and the practice reps? I've faced a lot of good local players who have made or narrowly missed cuts at recent big events, but I wouldn't consider them great players...they don't dominate the local scene, they're just known to be good.

I guess there's not a non-insulting way to put this, but I watch streams, I see results and I'm usually not all that impressed. I get that there's a skill difference, but it seems like a pretty small gap. List I see flown by top players isn't usually mind-blowing. Aside from Nathan, who seems to be an X-Wing savant, it's usually a slight variant on an existing meta list, presumably arrived at via a hive-mind with their play testing.

Does Git Gud really come down to Git A Group And Play a Lot? I guess that's how one usually gets good at anything.

11 minutes ago, gennataos said:

I've been wondering about the difference between good players and great players, and I guess that's the difference?...great players have play test groups and the practice reps? I've faced a lot of good local players who have made or narrowly missed cuts at recent big events, but I wouldn't consider them great players...they don't dominate the local scene, they're just known to be good.

I guess there's not a non-insulting way to put this, but I watch streams, I see results and I'm usually not all that impressed. I get that there's a skill difference, but it seems like a pretty small gap. List I see flown by top players isn't usually mind-blowing. Aside from Nathan, who seems to be an X-Wing savant, it's usually a slight variant on an existing meta list, presumably arrived at via a hive-mind with their play testing.

Does Git Gud really come down to Git A Group And Play a Lot? I guess that's how one usually gets good at anything.

I think there's a combination of stuff that happens. If you have a few good players in group, they get a lot of practice against good players whose opinions they trust. This lets them test weird stuff against known quality (not "I took this to a kit tournament and won")n so weird ideas get tested against known good lists and known good players, and the good stuff is either weeded out or in some way filters through to the groups mainline lists. There is then a threefold enhancement of a group of good players. You get more reps against good players, you get better list testing, and you get list testing against good players. That's where you get Dengaroo and Paratanni, incredibly powerful lists that were not present when their cards first hit.

13 minutes ago, Biophysical said:

I think there's a combination of stuff that happens. If you have a few good players in group, they get a lot of practice against good players whose opinions they trust. This lets them test weird stuff against known quality (not "I took this to a kit tournament and won")n so weird ideas get tested against known good lists and known good players, and the good stuff is either weeded out or in some way filters through to the groups mainline lists. There is then a threefold enhancement of a group of good players. You get more reps against good players, you get better list testing, and you get list testing against good players. That's where you get Dengaroo and Paratanni, incredibly powerful lists that were not present when their cards first hit.

Yeah, that makes sense. So those like me, who take the weird stuff and win a kit tourney, just lack the play test group to run that weird stuff through good players with good lists and see if the weird stuff is just weird or actually good. That's more at the root of my question. I'd suggest consistently doing well at even a small kit tournaments, particularly without top meta lists, demonstrates a player is good. So that kind of player can show up to to a bigger event with a top meta list and do well, but maybe miss the cut. What seems to separate them from the top names is that play testing and reps.

[edit] - To be clear, just because I do well at local small stuff doesn't mean I think I'm a few reps away from winning GenCon. I'm really just curious if it's worth the effort to try to assemble a play testing group in an effort for our group to do well at big events.

2 minutes ago, gennataos said:

Yeah, that makes sense. So those like me, who take the weird stuff and win a kit tourney, just lack the play test group to run that weird stuff through good players with good lists and see if the weird stuff is just weird or actually good. That's more at the root of my question. I'd suggest consistently doing well at even a small kit tournaments, particularly without top meta lists, demonstrates a player is good. So that kind of player can show up to to a bigger event with a top meta list and do well, but maybe miss the cut. What seems to separate them from the top names is that play testing and reps.

I don't have data, but I'd guess that's largely accurate. That's how it works with anything else.

Krayts Roll Natties

5 minutes ago, Biophysical said:

I don't have data, but I'd guess that's largely accurate. That's how it works with anything else.

Yeah, I guess it comes down to the skill gap and how wide it is. I suspect this game has a much slimmer skill gap than something like chess or even Magic.

1 minute ago, Boom Owl said:

Krayts Roll Natties

That's a skill I'll never acquire.

11 hours ago, Brunas said:

Can we go for maximum ego and say both? With our powers combined, we go Super Saiyan and channel a Krayt Spirit Bomb. I'm also partial to this as an acceptable explanation:

Jeez, thanks for bringing me back to middle school.

Someone tell Nathan to win worlds with this cuz he can.

On 8/20/2017 at 5:17 PM, Biophysical said:

In all seriousness, do you think it was more due to squad selection vs the meta or raw talent?

A bit of everything. Nathan and i built all comers lists with ships we were familiar with and new pieces to adjust for the meta. Nathan is obviously raw talent on top. I think i insulated myself from bad matchups very effectively . Tyler to a lesser extent followed that route as well, he often described nym as "better tel trevura." Chris took a strong list and put in a ton of work to understand his list vs the meta and how matchups affected him. Luck always is a part too, if lowrick doesnt finally wake up and start throwing natties against miranda im out in top 16. I'm sure everyone else had a game that was close as well.

Because i promised, the

10 hours ago, Biophysical said:

I did, but they either lied to me or effed up, and long story short, the timing was such that I would have had to bail on elimination rounds even if I hadn't played bad on Friday and taken myself out of the running. So fun times. I got boned by the universe and myself, and like any team game, I can now just blame the other guy.

Well I'm glad it worked out OK...ish?

Yes, always the teams fault. Or your dice!

WHY DOES THE SUBMIT BUTTON NOT WORK HALF THE TIME FFG PLZ

12 minutes ago, Brunas said:

Well I'm glad it worked out OK...ish?

Yes, always the teams fault. Or your dice!

Yeah, my wife was home with a 2 year old that had been cranky all week, and a 4 year old. Most car places are closed on Sunday, and I had visions of riding all the way to St. Louis on the doughnut spare and a prayer, because no GD way I was waiting until Monday for a fix, leaving my wife in purgatory for two more days, and possibly missing the eclipse on Monday.

37 minutes ago, Brunas said:

WHY DOES THE SUBMIT BUTTON NOT WORK HALF THE TIME FFG PLZ

Forum better!

Also, my 4 year old likes to play a game where she and one of us grownups are on a boat, so in honor of the Krayts, I got her to tell my wife "I'm the Captain Now."

I agree with the OP

R.I.P. TIE Swarm @Texx Git Gud

THERE ARE RUMORS ABOUT THAT WE HAVE COOPERATED WITH THE MYNOCK SQUADRON PODCAST

DO NOT BELIEVE THESE LIES, ANY AUDIO WHICH SOUNDS LIKE OUR VOICES WAS CLEARLY DOCTORED OR OBTAINED UNDER DURESS (WHICH THEY COULD NEVER PUT US IN SO IT'S DOCTORED)

FAKE NEWS

I agree

I agree

My phone doesn't have the Krayts in the podcast app. Anyone know where else I can find it?

On 8/21/2017 at 9:45 AM, gennataos said:

I've been wondering about the difference between good players and great players, and I guess that's the difference?...great players have play test groups and the practice reps? I've faced a lot of good local players who have made or narrowly missed cuts at recent big events, but I wouldn't consider them great players...they don't dominate the local scene, they're just known to be good.

I guess there's not a non-insulting way to put this, but I watch streams, I see results and I'm usually not all that impressed. I get that there's a skill difference, but it seems like a pretty small gap. List I see flown by top players isn't usually mind-blowing. Aside from Nathan, who seems to be an X-Wing savant, it's usually a slight variant on an existing meta list, presumably arrived at via a hive-mind with their play testing.

Does Git Gud really come down to Git A Group And Play a Lot? I guess that's how one usually gets good at anything.

I'd say a key but subtle point is that it's not just reps with whatever list you're going to be playing but also reps with/against what you're likely to be facing. It's fairly easy to pick up a lot of games, it's much more difficult to find a group of people who will play not their own lists but the list you need to practice against.

On 8/21/2017 at 11:45 AM, gennataos said:

I List I see flown by top players isn't usually mind-blowing. Aside from Nathan, who seems to be an X-Wing savant, it's usually a slight variant on an existing meta list, presumably arrived at via a hive-mind with their play testing.

What in the **** are you on about? Nathan was flying Corran/Miranda, that isn't some novel or ground-breaking list. Heck, Corran/Miranda was in the finals at Worlds last year, even, and both ships have individually been heavy parts of the meta for a long time.

List's that really blow minds are things like Dengaroo, which took everyone by surprise with a pile of upgrades no one ever used (Countermeasures?! lol. Zuckuss? What's he do?), and prior to Dengaroo no one was really running either Dengar or Manaroo. I'd hardly put Corran/Miranda on that level of "WOW Factor!"

22 minutes ago, AllWingsStandyingBy said:

What in the **** are you on about? Nathan was flying Corran/Miranda, that isn't some novel or ground-breaking list. Heck, Corran/Miranda was in the finals at Worlds last year, even, and both ships have individually been heavy parts of the meta for a long time.

He's probably referring to one of Nathan's previous lists that used a bombing Ashoka with scavenger crane to reapply the captured TIE mod that was weird and did kind of come out of nowhere.

Plus I'd say that while Corran/Miranda was fairly meta at one point but between Kylo and bombs the overall consensus seems to be that Corran is unplayable unless you're name is Nathan Eide. Which isn't that unreasonable considering he's currently ranked just under Roark Garnet on meta wing...

1 hour ago, AllWingsStandyingBy said:

What in the **** are you on about? Nathan was flying Corran/Miranda, that isn't some novel or ground-breaking list. Heck, Corran/Miranda was in the finals at Worlds last year, even, and both ships have individually been heavy parts of the meta for a long time.

List's that really blow minds are things like Dengaroo, which took everyone by surprise with a pile of upgrades no one ever used (Countermeasures?! lol. Zuckuss? What's he do?), and prior to Dengaroo no one was really running either Dengar or Manaroo. I'd hardly put Corran/Miranda on that level of "WOW Factor!"

Woah Nathan flew Miranda? Must had really wanted that Krayt bounty to put Nym on his list, but played Miranda instead.

I agree.. whole heartily