If you all are contrarian, then doesn't that mean the true contrary-ness is to actually play the meta?

I still try and play one step ahead of the meta. My competitive focus is all about beating players who are better than me. I will run whatever the boogeyman flavor of the month is so I REALLY know what the list is like.

I ran Rieekan aces for months. I formulated against it. But in the end, what I found was that the counter to Rieekan aces was Rieekan aces plus squadron damage mitigation, namely, Biggs, Jan and/or Gallant Haven. (And guess what took worlds.) This was my anti-mass-squad list: another mass squadron list dropping a little bit of bomber firepower for huge staying power in squadron fights.

--

When I'm not being competitive, then I run Ackbar AFs and Gladiators. Cuz I fell in love with them in Wave1 and 2. And I'll mess with home-boy Tarkin. The main reason I play this game is because I love the ship models. If I get to play with my physical ships, the ones I love (and the ones I'm getting to love), have a chance at winning, that's good enough.

Just note in the other thread: Our SSD is Xwing's ISD. They never got one. We did.

1 hour ago, Vergilius said:

I was already experimenting with MC30s in June/July 2013

Classic Ben.

4 hours ago, GiledPallaeon said:

The look of terror when two ISDs or two Liberties blitz my enemies is priceless, even when it backfires.

I was watching the regionals stream. That was a holy crap moment for me.

12 hours ago, Ardaedhel said:

Why do you choose not to play the archetype or specific list (or exploit the mechanic) that is currently overpowered? Bearing in mind that the specifics of that list vary by time and meta, and thus are going to be a moving target from person to person.

I cannot answer this question as I only play overpowered lists.

Currently, I see triple tap Luke as overpowered. I also see engine tech CRambo90s as overpowered. So I am building a list to exploit this.

Others may not see this as overpowered....... yet...... but they will learn.

The truth is I am not being contrary, I just see things differently to most. If everyone runs the same list then it isnt OP, its predictable. Nothing is easier to beat than predictable.

This is all somewhat theoretical since I don't really have a regular Armada community, let alone meta, but in any case:

I'm not a competitive person at all, and I don't really get a huge kick out of winning. In fact I quite often feel a little bit bad when I do (rarely) win if I think the other person wanted it more than I did (I know that's completely silly, but I can't help it). So I just fly the ships that I like and fleets that I think will be fun. That's not to say I don't try to have synergy and game plan, just that I'm not really looking for the most efficient way to do it.

There's also a little bit of the contrarian/diversity mindset: if the flavour of the month happened to be a fleet I did really like, I'd probably still not play it just because I don't want to contribute to the homogeneity.

I like fun and thematic; I've been running essentially the same balanced 4-activation MC80 carrier list (with some minor variation in squadrons) for over a year. So I accept it's reasonable but not optimal.

Imperial Relay squadron cheese makes me want to ragequit, though. Sure, activate all your squadrons from the opposite side of the board; that's fair.

9 hours ago, GiledPallaeon said:

1. I'm pretty sure most would qualify this as a contrarian PoV, but I don't like flying anything I would expect to face, so I'll go grab other things. I have my own theories and ideas, and I'll just build out of those. A large part of that is I have been playing long enough now I would like to think I have a good idea what works and doesn't work for a lot of ships, so I reach into that toolbox to grab what I need.

and

8 hours ago, Vergilius said:

I'm much of the same mind.

I like to experiment and explore. I crave variety. I also wanted to carve a spot in the build landscape, and so I can presently claim to be the person who almost singlehandedly put Madine on the landscape as a serious commander in his own right, and the Liberty on the landscape as a ship that deserves to be taken seriously. I can show up to a tournament and sometimes be the only one flying Madine and the only one flying a Liberty.

I have been of the same mind, believing that I could be that one creative individual who could read the meta and figure out that thing that could beat it. When I found that I simply did not have the time and energy to do that, I hoped that the off-the-wall list that I would bring would just be so off-the-wall that people would not know what to do with it.

Regrettably, things just didn't pan out that way. 'The meta' is not the product of netlisting sheep. They are the product of very intelligent people creating some really good combinations, and other people learning from them.

8 hours ago, Blail Blerg said:

If you all are contrarian, then doesn't that mean the true contrary-ness is to actually play the meta?

I still try and play one step ahead of the meta. ... I will run whatever the boogeyman flavor of the month is so I REALLY know what the list is like.

I think that this is really what I need to start doing. Maybe that will mean that I become a netlisting ovinoid, but I do think it will make me more competitive than I have become.

Of course, if everyone is contrarian, then really there is no-one who is contrarian, and there is no meta to be contrary to. I think it's safe to say that there is not quite that much contrarian-ness out there.

I think I actually do, but from a month that hasn’t happened yet.

I was fairly happy that it could take on all the meta lists comfortably, and then there went and nerfed then, so I’m laughing now.

The secret? A card everyone dismissed as rubbish.

Thing is, there seems to be a large number of people who just ‘know’ how good something is they’ll dismiss it offhand, and continue to do what they were doing.

They come over at tournaments, see the ships on the table, and say “Oh, thats cute”, before guffawing, and slinking back over to whatever is the rage at that one tourney on the other side of the world.

My biggest fear is that one day these people will find out and I’ll have to do something else.

(I have add that what I fly is actually quite commonly tried, but missing the secret ingredient, and then hence gets labelled with a weakness it doesn’t actually need to have.)

(I’ll also gladly say what the list is, because I have supreme confidence that people will continue to write it off. “No way that beats 130 points of bombers” etc etc.

List: Motti, dual ISDs with QLTs, Kallus, dual Gozanti. Only squadrons- Mauler and a Jumpmaster. Please try it, you might have fun.)

2 hours ago, TheCallum said:

List: Motti, dual ISDs with QLTs, Kallus, dual Gozanti. Only squadrons- Mauler and a Jumpmaster. Please try it, you might have fun.)

I believe it. Dual ISD is true OPness. I think I know what you consider to be the key ingredient, and it is point for Point the most consistently devastating card in the game, barring Yavaaris, and when used properly. Not OP on its own, but a solid trade off for what it accomplishes in the list.

I faced a similar one during worlds. The flavor of the month can take out one of those ISDs in a single turn, but then your squadrons are badly damaged and you’re left to deal with the other one, which an experienced player lined up to still have an activation left, followed by a devastating first activation the next round.

On 12/10/2017 at 0:51 AM, comatose said:

I took 6th at Michigan regionals with this list. If Biggs hadn’t won Ohio with Garm, I’d say Garm, TWO Peltas, THREE FCTs, and four flavors of B-Wings puts it into contrarian space.

<snip>

I was toward the back of the pack all day and only finished in 24th overall (which I'm happy about because I was on the last table going into round 4), so we didn't interact, but I just want to tell you I walked past one of your matches in progress on my way to lunch, stopped dead for just a second when I saw two peltas on table, like, 5, then thought about how this list must work for like the next half hour. I'm glad you posted it.

Because I'd rather be original and lose, than running what everyone else is and win. I may try out "meta" lists to see how they play, but I prefer to keep shifting to new fleets. I want variety in what I play, and while I respect players who have played various iterations of a list for years, that would personally drive me nuts!

And back to the spirit of the thread, competitively, I play what I think I can win with. Sometimes that’s the Meta, sometimes it’s a variation of the Meta (as with the worlds’ Pelta version of the aceholes).

Casually, I play with various builds to study the art of war within Armada. By commanding a wide variety of archetypes, I gain insight into the “other side” of the board. This also helps the creative juices to flow with regards to developing variations of the Meta (as I did with my worlds’ Pelta list), and helps to unlock new ways of looking at game mechanics and upgrades.

Like many of the others in this thread, I enjoy trying new things, but I do it more so for the satisfaction of catching a skilled opponent off guard even just once (@Vergilius can tell you all about that with our many practice sessions leading up to worlds) or learning how to apply an ubiquitous upgrade in an effective manner.

Virtue ethics, I believe it is called. The pursuit of the highest good within a realm—that is, to achieve peak performance at whatever I am doing. I gain satisfaction from doing well. So whether that lends itself to playing the Meta, finding a way to beat the Meta, or surpassing the Meta, that is what drives my builds.

On 12/9/2017 at 6:32 PM, PartyPotato said:

I hate Demo. Always have and always will.

Aww. What did I ever do to you, Potato?

I play Imperials because I am the OpFor for all my Rebel friends. Being Imperial, I can't help but play the underdog lists.

17 minutes ago, Democratus said:

Aww. What did I ever do to you, Potato?

I play Imperials because I am the OpFor for all my Rebel friends. Being Imperial, I can't help but play the underdog lists.

Lets just say you were terrible before Ben was a thing...

I never care about the flavor of the month.

I fly Victory or Imperial Star Destroyers, and lots of TIE Fighters or Interceptors. I want to have a Star Wars experience, and that's what feels like Star Wars.

Sometimes I sprinkle in Gozantis, Raiders or Kittens. Occasionally Gladiators, but they don't feel right. TIE Bombers make appearances regularly. The Villains pack rarely sees the table, nor the TIE Defenders or Phantoms.

When I play Rebels, the Rogues see the table more often. The Rebellion is a motley crew, so it fits in better.

Honestly, I just like to toy around with Armada like I was planning a diorama for a Star Wars history book or something. Currently, I'm throwing together a double-ISD list to "reenact" the Battle of Scarif, so massive amounts of TiE fighters and a massive f*ck-off-castle of grey pizza slices.

It's in the mind's eye that great scenes are born in Armada. Just as in X-Wing, we are blessed with a game whose dissonance between fluff and gameplay is often miniscule and whose balance is good enough that, especially when played casually, most if not all ships and squadrons can be made to work. Getting hold of the initiative, outplaying your opponent is more important than outplaying a mathematical advantage at all but the highest skill levels, and since that is where our monthly flavour is born, I don't have to be a part of it to do well against the opponents I face. In fact, I can't play flavour of the month as I only bought ships I knew I wanted to have fun with regardless of perceived power, and have won games with all of them in my short time of playing Armada.

One of the most fun ways to reexperience the variety of your favourite Wargame is to have an experienced player give challenges to both opponents in list building. These should be rough directions in order to still let the lists be the players' own, but force some out of the box thinking.

I think if there were more options and requirements more win-ways there would be more incentives to play other things.

My biggest reason for running anti-meta lists is that I'm an inner Johnny. Quality of wins is more important to me than quantity of wins. So, if my list is less consistent at tournaments but it's high in thematic awesomeness, I'm having more fun. For example, I just like big Imperial killdozers. Over the course of the past few years there have been plenty of times that I saw players having much more success with the latest MSU hotness, but I wouldn't enjoy compromising my preferred playstyle just to try and ape the current netlist-to-beat.

That said, I think there's also a crutch here. I don't have the attention to commit to tooling and retooling a list for months, studying the competition, and perfecting my strategy, the way that champion players do. I make mistakes that they wouldn't, and sometimes those mistakes cost me more points than my degree of meta-ness.

Identifying as a thematic player rather than a power gamer is true for me, but it's also a shield for my ego. "I didn't really lose, it's just that my opponent resorts to OP stuff and I take the high road" is a cop-out, and I'm far from the only Armada player who's guilty of secretly thinking it. I'm happy to own up to that weakness in the hopes that it disciplines my game a little bit. I'm not going to be a trendsetter with my fleets, and so I need to commit to playing the best with what I bring and not accepting excuses for my sloppy mistakes. Consider if you too harbor this idea.

The real reason I only play my own lists.

I don't avoid flavors of the month as much as I just like to run a new list every time I play

However good a fleet is to copy, the creator will always be better with it.

Also I dont own enough ships yet