This discussion is quickly devolving into a trend that Armada discussion always seems to head in: everyone is an armchair admiral expert, everyone pulls some random game from their past out as evidence, and the vast majority of people sound like apologists that just want to say "nu-uh, you're wrong , the game is awesomely balanced if you just do ______ (bid bigger, build a more jack-of-all-trades-fleet, fly better, stop making excuses and try and improve, etc)." Anytime anyone starts a critical conversation here about the game the response just starts to sound like an echo chamber whispering back "Git Gud."

And the thing with Armada is that, if we're being fair to ourselves, it's not nearly played enough to really have a strong sense of meta or expertise or balance. Even the " big " tournaments are often like 4 Rounds and a couple dozen people. Because of how long games are, it's not a game very many people are practicing weekly at their FLGS, it's not a game with a thriving nightly Vassal scene. Unlike a game like X-Wing, there simply aren't the statistically significantly large sample sets of completed events and game logs to draw from to support basically any of the positions one might take or express. Too few matches are played at events that are generally too small and too infrequently held to generate that sort of empirical evidence. Yet so many of us, myself included, speak as though our anecdotal experiences somehow give us the view from on high.

Heck, I feel like I could make up an Armada tournament report and post the results that a Garm all-Pelta fleet with no squadrons won, and a bunch of people would just post empty stuff like "Wow, yea this game is so balanced!" or "I've been saying the Petla was an awesome ship!" or "I've been using Garm for ages, he's so underrated, I took 3rd at the Podunk Open with him!" etc etc etc

15 minutes ago, AllWingsStandyingBy said:

This   discussi  on is  quickly devolving into a trend that A  rm  ada discussio  n  always seems to head in: everyone is an armchair admiral expe  r  t  ,    

Not just Armada. I’ve seen this same basic discussion a hundred times in various games. That’s why I tried to head it off at the pass with my posts.

15 minutes ago, AllWingsStandyingBy said:

Anytime  anyone starts a critical conversation here about the game the response just starts to sound like an echo chamber whisper  ing back "Git Gud."  

Wait, didn’t I predict that...

On 9/8/2018 at 8:17 PM, Forgottenlore said:

instead  of a  nother 20 page thread of "GIT GUD" - "WAAC" - "GIT GUD" - "WAAC" - "GIT GUD" - "WAAC" - "GIT GUD" - "WAAC"   

16 minutes ago, Forgottenlore said:

Not just Armada. I’ve seen this same basic discussion a hundred times in various games. That’s why I tried to head it off at the pass with my posts.

Head them off at the pass? I HATE that phrase!

Quote

Wait, didn’t I predict that...

So you got gud at predicting people gitting gud?

1 minute ago, geek19 said:

So  you got  gud at predicting people git  ting gud? 

No, I got gud at predicting people whinging at other people to git gud

36 minutes ago, AllWingsStandyingBy said:

This discussion is quickly devolving into a trend that Armada discussion always seems to head in: everyone is an armchair admiral expert, everyone pulls some random game from their past out as evidence, and the vast majority of people sound like apologists that just want to say "nu-uh, you're wrong , the game is awesomely balanced if you just do ______ (bid bigger, build a more jack-of-all-trades-fleet, fly better, stop making excuses and try and improve, etc)." Anytime anyone starts a critical conversation here about the game the response just starts to sound like an echo chamber whispering back "Git Gud."

And the thing with Armada is that, if we're being fair to ourselves, it's not nearly played enough to really have a strong sense of meta or expertise or balance. Even the " big " tournaments are often like 4 Rounds and a couple dozen people. Because of how long games are, it's not a game very many people are practicing weekly at their FLGS, it's not a game with a thriving nightly Vassal scene. Unlike a game like X-Wing, there simply aren't the statistically significantly large sample sets of completed events and game logs to draw from to support basically any of the positions one might take or express. Too few matches are played at events that are generally too small and too infrequently held to generate that sort of empirical evidence. Yet so many of us, myself included, speak as though our anecdotal experiences somehow give us the view from on high.

Heck, I feel like I could make up an Armada tournament report and post the results that a Garm all-Pelta fleet with no squadrons won, and a bunch of people would just post empty stuff like "Wow, yea this game is so balanced!" or "I've been saying the Petla was an awesome ship!" or "I've been using Garm for ages, he's so underrated, I took 3rd at the Podunk Open with him!" etc etc etc

I would have won that Podunk Open, too, if @comatose and his Dual Pelta hadn't been there....

Is your complaint here that "No is agreeing with me that the game isn't balanced" or that "No one is agreeing with me that there's not enough data to tell that we don't know anything"? Because our store has had 3 games per week minimum recently, often heading towards 4-5 the last couple of weeks. We have 60 people signed up for the Fall Vassal tournament, which seems large to me. And I can point to most of the NOVA top 8 knowing their stuff and having expertise and good ability. So I'm not sure what your argument is trying to be, that since we're not as big as X-wing we thus can't say anything about the game?

8 minutes ago, geek19 said:

So I'm not sure what your argument is trying to be, that since we're not as big as X-wing we thus can't say anything about the game?

My point is basically that I'm not sure what the value of online forum discussions about balance in Armada are worth, since most people say far more about the game far more confidently than their experience would warrant, and even in cases where that isn't an issue the evidence that is out there is not really collected, analyzed, or later accessible to others. This makes it hard to draw many convincing empirical conclusions from it, and since it can't really be referenced no one can really even cite it (vs say something like List Juggler in X-Wing, which will have often full results from hundreds of events over the past few months), so at the end of the day these discussions often just read like everyone tossing out anecdotal evidence (which most people are doing, to be fair), but even those with more of a finger on the pulse of the competitive game don't have much in the way of data to stand on and have a hard if not impossible time of convincing the anecdote-only-camp that their position is, in fact, actually more empirical sound.

The discussion seems to be veering sharply off topic.

Again, the OPs post doesn't really have anything to do with balance, or performance, or tournament results.

The discussion is about the nature of the gameplay, and level of importance the design of the game and the way it is sold puts on pre-game list building vs in game decision making.

1 hour ago, AllWingsStandyingBy said:

This discussion is quickly devolving into a trend that Armada discussion always seems to head in: everyone is an armchair admiral expert, everyone pulls some random game from their past out as evidence, and the vast majority of people sound like apologists that just want to say "nu-uh, you're wrong , the game is awesomely balanced if you just do ______ (bid bigger, build a more jack-of-all-trades-fleet, fly better, stop making excuses and try and improve, etc)." Anytime anyone starts a critical conversation here about the game the response just starts to sound like an echo chamber whispering back "Git Gud."

And the thing with Armada is that, if we're being fair to ourselves, it's not nearly played enough to really have a strong sense of meta or expertise or balance. Even the " big " tournaments are often like 4 Rounds and a couple dozen people. Because of how long games are, it's not a game very many people are practicing weekly at their FLGS, it's not a game with a thriving nightly Vassal scene. Unlike a game like X-Wing, there simply aren't the statistically significantly large sample sets of completed events and game logs to draw from to support basically any of the positions one might take or express. Too few matches are played at events that are generally too small and too infrequently held to generate that sort of empirical evidence. Yet so many of us, myself included, speak as though our anecdotal experiences somehow give us the view from on high.

Heck, I feel like I could make up an Armada tournament report and post the results that a Garm all-Pelta fleet with no squadrons won, and a bunch of people would just post empty stuff like "Wow, yea this game is so balanced!" or "I've been saying the Petla was an awesome ship!" or "I've been using Garm for ages, he's so underrated, I took 3rd at the Podunk Open with him!" etc etc etc

It has a lot to do with polarizing the debate since the beginning subtlety stealing things from other people.

I mean I cannot hope a rational and deep debate about something if I open with something like "Good sportsmanship vs playing football" no matter how many "and I'm ok with it" I added to the text wall.

19 minutes ago, Forgottenlore said:

The discussion is about the nature of the gameplay, and level of importance the design of the game and the way it is sold puts on pre-game list building vs in game decision making.

Yea, to that end, especially at the casual level of trying to enjoy the game, FFG would be well-served by applying their new "quick builds" resources in X-Wing to Armada with "quick fleets" references and lite write-ups behind their basic strategy and approaches. Kind of like MtG does with starter decks. Or lots of other games do with 'learn to play' resources that are much deeper and more expanded than what one finds in the starter kit. That way, those who don't want to master the list-building side of things can quickly put two forces down onto the table that are pre-built and generally fun to play against one another.

6 minutes ago, geek19 said:

Head them off at the pass? I HATE that phrase!

Awesome quote! I love Mel Brooks

But the discussion started as a comment that the original poster felt that there was too much pre game meta think, and there was little to no skill involved with the playing of the actual game. They wanted more skill and reaction in the game and less net think. They also really disliked the hard counter system. Those are points that can be debated, as first off, while clearly not all people like the list tailoring aspect of the game (as at least the original poster does not) many do (I am one, there are many you-tubers who seem to), so the fact is that people love different parts of the game, and so many commentators here were trying to say that people who complain about certain aspects need to understand that there are others who love those aspects, and that there is still a lot of what they were having trouble seeing in the game as well (as given the number of players who do well consistently with different lists, there is definitely a bunch of skill involved).

These points at least are all pretty empirical.

As well, well everyone may not enjoy when a list faces a counter to it, if your list has a direct counter, and one to which there is no hope of a victory (which is again the op's comment), it means you have specialized, as it is the counter to that specialization that you are complaining about. Sorry, a definite aspect of list building theory is that you either specialize, and run the risk of running into a counter, or, you try to be a generalist, have no hard counter, but also have no point in which you excelled. This means trying to delay the other's specialization while exploiting the bits they weakened to specialize. As a generalist you theoretically have that ability, but your lack of focus means it can be hard to do both. When building a list, you are inherently going for one or the other (even subconsciously when picking stuff 'because it's cool' or you 'just want to try something'-both being totally fine ways to build fleets) as even those ways you'll wind up with a list that is strong in an area, or is a generalist. Whether you enjoy when you face a hard counter, that's up to you, but if you take something that has a hard counter, you need to be prepared that you can and will face it. Unless we are playing chess or checkers, (or the equivalent, where everyone runs exactly the same fleet), it is the nature of war games that you will face lists that you are better or worse against.

As for the time taken to play a game, well that's this game. There's nothing that can really be done about that bit. Play Raddus or Large ships? Avoid squadrons? Those tend to speed up games, so you'll win or loose quicker?

If you really don't like having to deal with a hard counter fleet, deploy all your ships on your table edge, facing yourself and fly off turn 1. Then, if it's not a tournament, talk to your opponent and try to come up with lists that do not hard counter each other. Note, this is not me saying'get gud''or casual vs competitive' -no matter what game you are playing, playing a loosing battle can suck. But you can either choose to make the best of it, take it as a challenge as see how good you can do, or to not play and throw the game or walk away.

If it is a tournament, you're stuck, that's the nature of tournaments, you pick a list and are stuck with it for a certain number of games. If you really hate matches with counters, maybe don't play tournaments. That's not saying 'don't play to win', but just don't play where you have to run the same thing lots of times with no chance to change it. If you are playing a pick up game (as casually or competitively as you like), talk to your opponent. Ask them if they have another fleet, or if you can change yours as the match-up will not be fun (though don't then build an exact counter to their fleet, or neither of you will enjoy it).

Based on personal experience (so by no means scientific-there stated it)- I find that Armada has way less of these issues than many other games I play, especially the Warhammer type games, Cool Mini or Not's Wrath of Kings, and the now defunct Marvel Mini's game, but that's me. Does it mean the game is perfect? No, but that it is currently one of my weekly gaming group's favorite games as we have to deal with the above issues less for it, in our opinions, than for other games. Though it could just be because it's easy to transport, lol.

It is at this point that people try to bring up examples from their own experience, and from the games that some of the top players have played, as otherwise people would claim that any argument are spacious and have no factual basis. Is there as much evidence as there is for some games? No, especially since we just had a major switch up of the competitive scene and people are still adjusting and trying things out post FAQ. But there are still some broad trends that can be seen. Is it perfect? No. Is it balanced? Depends on your definition but as has been pointed out that's a debate in another thread.

14 minutes ago, AllWingsStandyingBy said:

applying their new "quick builds" resources in X-Wing to Armada with "quick fleets" references and lite write-ups behind their basic strategy and approaches.

I like the idea, but I think it would be harder to implement in Armada than in x-wing because of the larger, strategic nature of Armada. In x-wing you can fly ships in different ways, but pretty much every ship CAN (doesn’t have to be, but can) be built in a way that it functions mostly independently. While in Armada, fleets are built so that the ships (and squadrons) are much more interconnected. You can’t exactly design a quick build for a raider and expect to be able to drop it effectively into any fleet. So, like you said, they would need to be whole, pre-designed, fleets, which means they would have to make assumptions about what other ships the player has access too. You’d definitely end up with situations where a player gets a quick fleet card (card? Pamphlet?) and can’t use it because it calls for stuff he doesn’t have.

(There has to have been a shorter way of saying that).

1 hour ago, AllWingsStandyingBy said:

Yea, to that end, especially at the casual level of trying to enjoy the game, FFG would be well-served by applying their new "quick builds" resources in X-Wing to Armada with "quick fleets" references and lite write-ups behind their basic strategy and approaches. Kind of like MtG does with starter decks. Or lots of other games do with 'learn to play' resources that are much deeper and more expanded than what one finds in the starter kit. That way, those who don't want to master the list-building side of things can quickly put two forces down onto the table that are pre-built and generally fun to play against one another.

That's an idea I like. Maybe I even do by myself.

1 hour ago, Forgottenlore said:

I like the idea, but I think it would be harder to implement in Armada than in x-wing because of the larger, strategic nature of Armada. In x-wing you can fly ships in different ways, but pretty much every ship CAN (doesn’t have to be, but can) be built in a way that it functions mostly independently. While in Armada, fleets are built so that the ships (and squadrons) are much more interconnected. You can’t exactly design a quick build for a raider and expect to be able to drop it effectively into any fleet. So, like you said, they would need to be whole, pre-designed, fleets, which means they would have to make assumptions about what other ships the player has access too. You’d definitely end up with situations where a player gets a quick fleet card (card? Pamphlet?) and can’t use it because it calls for stuff he doesn’t have.

(There has to have been a shorter way of saying that).

If only there were a forum or something with battlereports, successful lists from competitive events, and a subforum for personalized fleet feedback, suggestions and strategy discussion. Then maybe new players would have an easier time cobbling together a fleet. ?

But seriously. All someone has to do is ask over in fleet builds and they’ll get a fleet built for them, within the constraints of their collection. Anything FFG puts out has the problem you mention, and frankly, their sample lists and loadouts have never impressed me. Great resources exist; they just aren’t directly from FFG.

51 minutes ago, The Jabbawookie said:

If only there were a forum or something with battlereports, successful lists from competitive events, and a subforum for personalized fleet feedback, suggestions and strategy discussion. Then maybe new players would have an easier time cobbling together a fleet. ?

I'm sure, you would find such resources in the Internet, if you would dig hard enough.

But honestly, to come back to the OP's thoughts: I'm no tournament-player for sure but i still love Armada for it's pre-battle thinking. I can only play it once a month or even less, because of this unnecessary distractions in my life like Job(s) and Family. But after each of these seldom games i take great pleasure in sitting down for some minutes for enhancing "my" fleet. This gives me the opportunity to enjoy the game without actually playing it. And then, after all this brainwork, I go to the table and get my *** kicked, just because some dice rolled like crap or i do a stupid mistake. But sometimes it works.

In the end, Armada Shows pretty well von Clausewitz's definitions of strategy vs. tactics; Strategy is about how you arrange your battles and under what conditions you enter them, while tactics is about how you handle the battle itself (under the given conditions). And that is the great strength (and my joy) of Armada: you can think about and influence both of them. In contrary to chess you can use the kind of forces that you like most and that you can handle best. Sometimes that is not the same. To learn about this and to improve yourself is one of the major aspects for me to play Armada. And, of course, to see the wonderful dance of mighty spaceships tearing each other apart (this being the reason, i don't like these buzzing, annoying insect-swarms of squadrons).

After decades of playing other confrontative games (especially Battletech) i find that you always enjoy winning. No one enters these games just for the cool look of it. And in this regard, it doesen't matter if in tournament or just "for fun". The difference between competetive and casual seems to me, that the competetive gamer simply invests more (time, money, committment, brainwork) in the victory itself. While the casual gamer just "takes the chance" to do the game and enjoys the experience of playing. Don't get me wrong: neither is "better", each has it's own qualitys (and therefore fans). And the two aspects are no black-or-white, everyone is somewhere between the to extremes. The only thing you really have to do is to find enough people who are roughly in the same shade of gray like you (I'm fully aware of the pun ).

There is nearly no game that has this kind of "unequal Balance" like Armada.

Just my two Cents....

11 hours ago, >kkj said:

Really?... what about Xi7/APs? Vader Gunneryteam Cymoons vs Hammerheads? Sloane Aces vs no squadrons? Rieekan Yavaris vs no or few squadrons? (Just take a look at what won german nationals -surprise rieekan yavaris aces again) Last first with huge ini bid vs 2 activation lists? Ackbar Tank Fleet against Arquitens?

Those combinations look at lot like Rock Paper Scissors to me, not to speak of certain objectives that clearly benefit specific fleettypes. If you just have bad luck and have to play against a counter fleet to your fleet you automatically are at a disadvantage. My point is in a 400 point match were both players have the same amount of pointinvestment available you shouldnt be at a disadvantage or advantage just because of which matchup (completely out of your control) you have to play.

Surprise, it was not Rieekan it was Dodonna for the german nationals .
But i won with it against 2 heavy squadron lists in the cut. And i didn't win because my list was better. Both had a really good chance to beat me. I would say i won because i was more experienced and forced my opponents in disadvantageous decisions. Especially against Sloane Aces it is gamble game. It can end either way, and is mostly affected by the game of the two players, and not by the list ahead of it.

And Sloanve Aces vs. no squadrons can lose. I lost with it against @Green Knight . And it was decided on the game, when Green Knight was flying good, and i was doing faults and went for his game. He forced me into this during the game, and not ahead of it.

But basically i can agree with you in some parts. The lists decide already alot of the game. And i can really often tell ahead of the game how it might go. But all this always under the assumement that i can force the player to play my game, or that i can predict what he will do.
The game is not decided with the lists. They only give a good bonus. But in the end the game can go totally different to what some expect.
And i am not even adding the luck part. Some matches are decided by this, but this is not the norm and most of the time really uncommon (but it happens).

And one last part. Armada is not about simple win/lose (ignore the stupid ruling with the cut, i hope they change this really soon). It is about the MOV, how big you win or lose.
If you face a match that is not really positive for you, or if you face a really Anti list to yours, you have to make sure you are not going down with a 1-10. Try to go for a 5-6 or 4-7. You can easy compensate this with high wins.
But if you (or your fleet) cannot win high, or cannot prevent a deverstating loss, you will have no change to end in the top places. And yes, THIS is decided in the begin when you are building your fleet.
If you build a fleet that is struggling with most other lists, does not has missions with victory tokens, will always loose at least half of the ships, than you will have problems to win really well.

And this brings us back to the first part. Anti lists that are playing against each other. You have always and in all games the paper/scissors/rock system. And this is good, because it is a natural balance. If you don't have it you will have one dominate list that is superior to all other or you have all lists that are the same.
The only question is how well are you prepared to play against your Anti list, and what can you do against it. How well can you get out of this and how many points does it cost you.

For example Squadrons vs. no Squadrons. Can you take out the ships or at least the carrier? Can you sepperate the carrier from the squadrons? Do you have enough Flak to just take out the squadrons? Can you play the mission instead and go for the points? If you know that Squadron lists are your weakness, what can and want you do against this? And how can you adjust your play style to force him into your game or force him into making faults. Or total simple, can you sit it out and go for a 6-5 or 5-6 draw (bunker yourself in a corner or just hide/run)?
Yes, these are questions that you have to ask yourself ahead of the games, when building the fleet. But without answering these questions you already lost the first part of the game. It is the same as in all other games. The list/fleet/deck building, where you need a plan, a red line. You just cannot throw together some cards and hope that it will win against all lists.

Ok, enough of it, i started the same as you, with just writing down some thoughts and it is becoming longer and longer (and harder to read)

1 minute ago, Tokra said:

Surprise, it was not Rieekan it was Dodonna for the german nationals .
But i won with it against 2 heavy squadron lists in the cut. And i didn't win because my list was better. Both had a really good chance to beat me. I would say i won because i was more experienced and forced my opponents in disadvantageous decisions. Especially against Sloane Aces it is gamble game. It can end either way, and is mostly affected by the game of the two players, and not by the list ahead of it.

And Sloanve Aces vs. no squadrons can lose. I lost with it against @Green Knight . And it was decided on the game, when Green Knight was flying good, and i was doing faults and went for his game. He forced me into this during the game, and not ahead of it.

But basically i can agree with you in some parts. The lists decide already alot of the game. And i can really often tell ahead of the game how it might go. But all this always under the assumement that i can force the player to play my game, or that i can predict what he will do.
The game is not decided with the lists. They only give a good bonus. But in the end the game can go totally different to what some expect.
And i am not even adding the luck part. Some matches are decided by this, but this is not the norm and most of the time really uncommon (but it happens).

And one last part. Armada is not about simple win/lose (ignore the stupid ruling with the cut, i hope they change this really soon). It is about the MOV, how big you win or lose.
If you face a match that is not really positive for you, or if you face a really Anti list to yours, you have to make sure you are not going down with a 1-10. Try to go for a 5-6 or 4-7. You can easy compensate this with high wins.
But if you (or your fleet) cannot win high, or cannot prevent a deverstating loss, you will have no change to end in the top places. And yes, THIS is decided in the begin when you are building your fleet.
If you build a fleet that is struggling with most other lists, does not has missions with victory tokens, will always loose at least half of the ships, than you will have problems to win really well.

And this brings us back to the first part. Anti lists that are playing against each other. You have always and in all games the paper/scissors/rock system. And this is good, because it is a natural balance. If you don't have it you will have one dominate list that is superior to all other or you have all lists that are the same.
The only question is how well are you prepared to play against your Anti list, and what can you do against it. How well can you get out of this and how many points does it cost you.

For example Squadrons vs. no Squadrons. Can you take out the ships or at least the carrier? Can you sepperate the carrier from the squadrons? Do you have enough Flak to just take out the squadrons? Can you play the mission instead and go for the points? If you know that Squadron lists are your weakness, what can and want you do against this? And how can you adjust your play style to force him into your game or force him into making faults. Or total simple, can you sit it out and go for a 6-5 or 5-6 draw (bunker yourself in a corner or just hide/run)?
Yes, these are questions that you have to ask yourself ahead of the games, when building the fleet. But without answering these questions you already lost the first part of the game. It is the same as in all other games. The list/fleet/deck building, where you need a plan, a red line. You just cannot throw together some cards and hope that it will win against all lists.

Ok, enough of it, i started the same as you, with just writing down some thoughts and it is becoming longer and longer (and harder to read)

There are a lot of good points here.

Since u mentioned our semi-final game, I think we both knew u would win 9 of 10 games.

Then you proceeded to set up exactly where I could most easily get to your ISD, while your squadrons started killing gozanti padding, which would have become irrelevant once my ISD was in range.

Exactly what I wanted you to do, and I'm sure you have decided NOT to.

So yes, there are some matchups that are harder, based on fleet composition.

But yours was not the first squad heavy fleet I blew apart. I already killed several Sloane, and this was before the tabling faq.

Yours was the first I expected to lose to. Partly bc of matchup, but also in no small part bc of skill level.

On 9/8/2018 at 6:36 PM, >kkj said:

This is why i often think a game with less options to customize and specialize your forces and instead with more options in base mechanics might make a better table top wargame, because it puts the focus more on flexible decision making during the game, rather than on armchair-building your fleet at home and then basically let it work by itself due to its overspecialized composition. (I know thats an exaggeration, but you get the point!)

I think, that's the key-sentence of the OP. To paraphrase it: "Would less options in fleet building lead to a better game experience?"

And the answer is (as always): "It depends on what you want."

The queen of all strategic war-games is chess. It has no fleet building, no deployment options. It unfolds always from the same board state and in nearly completely balanced. (White has an advantage going first.) Therefore chess affords what kkj said "flexible decision making during the game, rather than armchair-building your fleet". One could buy star wars chess figures and be completely happy playing that.

Armada is not chess. It gives us the opportunity to design our fleet, to design every ship in it. Due to that (and to Objective Cards) every game starts completely different, more like an unique event, than a well balanced set up for intellectual combat. (Please don't let me be misunderstood: Armada is still high grade intellectual combat. Fleet design and deployment is part of that. And because everybody has access to all units and cards it is balanced as a whole.)

I know kkj and I know he doesn't want Armada to be like chess. He just wanted to plea for less Min-Max-ing in fleet building process. He wanted us to be less interested in optimizing and having more fun playing.

But that's pointless, I am afraid. Because some people have very much fun optimizing their fleet(s). And who just wants to have a good time playing without focusing to hard at Min-Max-ing and winning their games 10-1, well, that is what we call a casual player. So it boils down to: Is it better to be a tournament guy or a casual player?

I believe, the issue came up because kkj and I are at a point where we are more or less at the top of our turf. So we went to some tournaments to experience another level of play. That wasn't lately too successful for both of us. So we are in a sort of space in between: Too much tournament players for home turf and too casual still for regionals.

And there is no real solution to this dilemma at that point. We can only decide if we want to go on and become more tournament guys, investing more time in success-orientated fleet building and practicing -- or fall back and play casual lacking a good number of players that will give us a hard fight. (And I know what my wife would suggest!) Always loosing at tournaments is not much more satisfying than always winning easily against people who don't want to play against you quite soon. That's it.

So that was that and I apologize if I misinterpret the post and emotional state of kkj, which I appreciate as a friend in real life and an enemy at the board.

Recommended reading: https://intelsweep.wordpress.com/2018/09/10/the-overnight-report-nova-top-cut/

Proof, in my opinion, that the game is not decided once the fleets are built. Captain Weather (an incredibly experienced player, Australia National Champion) makes his best predictions, based on fleet composition, who will win in the NOVA top cut. He isn't always right, and sometimes his guess is more of a toss-up. (And yes, he sometimes predicted the exact outcome. Experienced sports and chess analysts can do the same thing sometimes.) Examples:

Alexandra v Jeremy

Prediction: Targeting scramblers really hate consistent long range firepower, and everything else in Jeremy’s list hates it as well. Strong win to Alexandra.

Result: Apparently both players flew below their usual standard. Quasar burned, but Interdictor ground down the Arqs and the Raider.

6-5 to Jeremy

Mark v Jason

Prediction: If Jason can first last onto Yavaris and the Pelta before the Yavaris squads goes to work it will be a strong win to him. Otherwise, Mark solidly.

Result: Jason took out Yavaris in an early exchange. This pretty much sealed the game in my opinion.

8-3 to Jason

The second one is really interesting. He didn't want to say for sure who would win because of things that go beyond fleet composition: picking objectives, deployment, and how they play the game. Not to mention dice rolls.

I will agree that at the competitive level, most games are probably "won from deployment." But fleet composition alone? It certainly helps to have a good fleet, but it's not all there is. If I tried take Truthiness' Raddus fleet or Tokra's Dodonna fleet to a Regional championship, I'd lose because it takes the skill to fly them.

1 hour ago, Triangular said:

The queen of all strategic war-games is chess. It has no fleet building, no deployment options. It unfolds always from the same board state and in nearly completely balanced. (White has an advantage going first.) Therefore chess affords what kkj said "flexible decision making during the game, rather than armchair-building your fleet". One could buy star wars chess figures and be completely happy playing that.

Then the King is Diplomacy which has not fleet building, no deployment options, is nearly completely balanced and works with some kind of real time emulation. Isn't it?

1 minute ago, ovinomanc3r said:

Then the King is Diplomacy which has not fleet building, no deployment options, is nearly completely balanced and works with some kind of real time emulation. Isn't it?

I would prefer Go, chinese war game, more strategic than tactical endeavor. But if you like Diplomacy to be king, than Go is maybe (chinese) Emperor? ?

20 minutes ago, Triangular said:

I would prefer Go, chinese war game, more strategic than tactical endeavor. But if you like Diplomacy to be king, than Go is maybe (chinese) Emperor? ?

No real time emulation so let it be the jester. ?

1 hour ago, ovinomanc3r said:

No real time emulation so let it be the jester. ?

https://online-go.com/

?

8 minutes ago, Triangular said:

https://online-go.com/

?

I didn't mean it is not streamed. I mean all players play at the same time, not turns involved. No first player, second player.

@>kkj

I've only ready the first post, so I'm not sure anyone has mentioned this.

The reason I play is fun . Armada has always been fun for me and my friends. The differentiation of "casual" and "competitive" is interesting to me, as I don't know a different set of actual rules for each. I've only played the actual 300 then 400 then CC rules. There is always a chance that fleets have bad matchups. It is part of the game IMO.

The minute you start trying to come up with two fleets to engage each other beforehand, I think that is a different game altogether.

Ok, I guess everyone is still looking at this game as a competitive match up.... by that, I mean... any game that is built around and focuses on tournament play is going to have min maxing and that, in this game, comes during the fleet creation. It becomes the metta, etc... We need to be thankful that such power creep that "crept" into X-wing has not ruined Armada....

Strategy and Tactics comes into play long before the ships hit the table.... fleet building is very important.... and you build your fleet to accomplish certain goals... you come to the table to complete those goals.

Once on the table, it becomes much more tactics.... strategy only comes into play when trying to work on your "pre-game" set up..... card combos, etc....

On the table top, it is know what the enemy can do, what their ships can do, etc....

Strategy is your build to meet a goal in the game.. tactics is how you perform on the table... whether you are over matched, evenly matched or out matched.....

Like it or not, Armada is a tournament based game..... and the fleet builds will always reflect that.

If you want REAL strategy and Tactics.... play a campaign game..... with chance encounters, skeleton fleets to protect resource planets, etc.... random encounters.... be the force commander AND the admiral.....