44 minutes ago, theBitterFig said:

Better for whom?

Not better for the players on the bubble who played the game honestly, but due to an early rather than a late loss get locked out of the cut by players taking draws.

They really aren't.

Try not losing.

1 hour ago, theBitterFig said:

Better for whom?

Better for those players who want to collude to lock up the cut rather than actually play the game out and risk being knocked out.

2 hours ago, Icareane said:

@kerbarian : the issue with point destroyed giving TP is that it increases the pairing luck factor.

You want to reward a close win between two high skill players the same as a landslide victory of a high skill player versus a low skill player. Otherwise initial matchups can determine the outcome of the tournament.

You’d get just as many points for a 200-170 victory as a 200-0 victory. What gets penalized is going to time rather than the victory being a close one. I’d like to think that with a system like this top players would prioritize playing faster and finishing games within time because it’s to the benefit of both players.

And the pairing luck factor already exists for MoV. The solution is “don’t lose games” and then MoV doesn’t matter, but in practice it matters for a bunch of players and is affected by pairing luck.

However, I agree that it’s a big risk changing scoring so that you could win all your games and still not make the cut. That’s kinda the point, though — to make it so that stalling and winning all your games with very little engagement wouldn’t be a winning strategy.

I think there’s a good chance the specific points I suggested would cause more problems than they solve (including pairing luck like you mentioned), but I feel like there might be something promising in that general direction.

An in-between solution would be 1 TP for destroying at least 100 points but not an extra one for destroying 200.

1 hour ago, Chumbalaya said:

Try not losing.

That's what I'd say to anyone who wanted to ID. Play your game, try to win, and if you get beat by someone sneaking up on you, well, you should have gotten better MOV.

That's what I'd say to anyone whining about a Starviper hover. Get in there and outplay an opponent. Ace players aren't entitled to wins, aren't entitled to superior engagements. You want a better engagement? Make it happen on the table. Don't get a judge to invalidate your opponent, just because you can't beat it in a fight.

2 hours ago, Chumbalaya said:

IDs are fine, stalling is not.

I really don’t like brussel sprouts, but I would prefer eating one to consuming a rabbit pellet. However, I chose to eat neither for dinner tonight.

Perhaps we just operate from a different frame of reference. For me, the SW genre looms large when I think about and play this game. I can’t envision Vader casually touring a ring of asteroids with his buddies and NOT engaging rebels easily in blaster range.

Sure, one could say that Vader is letting them go as part of a larger trap - which is great fodder for a book, movie, or RPG. However, this is a dogfighting game patterned after SW dogfights which Lucas said where inspired by WWII dogfights! I don’t think they really were going for IDs in the Battle of Britain, Midway, etc.

2 hours ago, theBitterFig said:

That's what I'd say to anyone who wanted to ID. Play your game, try to win, and if you get beat by someone sneaking up on you, well, you should have gotten better MOV.

That's what I'd say to anyone whining about a Starviper hover. Get in there and outplay an opponent. Ace players aren't entitled to wins, aren't entitled to superior engagements. You want a better engagement? Make it happen on the table. Don't get a judge to invalidate your opponent, just because you can't beat it in a fight.

I think that’s peoples issue with the stalling tactic. People can’t make superior engagements against this kind of list. If the viper player doesn’t want to engage where you are trying to make them, they don’t. They know full well they have 12 die coming in FS. Mitch even said earlier, he controls 2 table edges, it’s hard to flank that.

I know you can fit 4 Nanteks into a list. Would you sit in a corner for 75 minutes and go for FS against a Viper list?

New Squadron

(44) General Grievous [Belbullab-22 Starfighter]
(4) Impervium Plating
(1) Crack Shot
(6) Soulless One
Points: 55

(38) Petranaki Arena Ace [Nantex-class Starfighter]
(10) Ensnare
Points: 48

(38) Petranaki Arena Ace [Nantex-class Starfighter]
(10) Ensnare
Points: 48

(39) Chertek [Nantex-class Starfighter]
(10) Ensnare
Points: 49

Total points: 200

1 hour ago, Pewpewpew BOOM said:

I really don’t like brussel sprouts, but I would prefer eating one to consuming a rabbit pellet. However, I chose to eat neither for dinner tonight.

Have you tried roasting sprouts with a little vegetable oil and some salt? They're the king of vegetables!

6 minutes ago, Biophysical said:

Have you tried roasting sprouts with a little vegetable oil and some salt? They're the king of vegetables!

You forgot the garlic butter too.

What you really need with brussel sprouts is some bacon and butter.

Bacon is still op though 😋 .

1 hour ago, Archangelspiv said:

I think that’s peoples issue with the stalling tactic. People can’t make superior engagements against this kind of list. If the viper player doesn’t want to engage where you are trying to make them, they don’t. They know full well they have 12 die coming in FS. Mitch even said earlier, he controls 2 table edges, it’s hard to flank that.

I know you can fit 4 Nanteks into a list. Would you sit in a corner for 75 minutes and go for FS against a Viper list?

New Squadron

(44) General Grievous [Belbullab-22 Starfighter]
(4) Impervium Plating
(1) Crack Shot
(6) Soulless One
Points: 55

(38) Petranaki Arena Ace [Nantex-class Starfighter]
(10) Ensnare
Points: 48

(38) Petranaki Arena Ace [Nantex-class Starfighter]
(10) Ensnare
Points: 48

(39) Chertek [Nantex-class Starfighter]
(10) Ensnare
Points: 49

Total points: 200

The tractor - micro thrusters interaction makes this a VERY bad matchup for the Vipers. Combined with the init disadvantage and the inability to effectively block the nantex, I would expect the Vipers to loose handily to this list.

I fought 2 nantex lists at worlds. While I did win both matchups, there was some favorable dice on my side.

Sun-fac plus droid swarm. I got lucky calling the exact timing that sun Fac would try to approach and managed to isolate the engagement to 4 vipers vs sun at R3. Then followed up by killing 3/5 drones on the following turn.

Chertek/sear/dfs-311/3x trade fed. Big Acrylic was a bit more cautious with Chertek and didn't give me many quality shots on him. I had good dice on the approach and managed to isolate DFS-311 on the first turn and init kill 2 more drones on the second turn. I think my opponent was forced to make more conservative moves to play against the wide range of positions a Starviper list can take. I picked up a lead, but Andrew was eating into it at the rapid rate. Game ended 124-123 my favor.

Both lists only had 1 nantex that could either be played around or killed. My headsim does not project a favorable outcome for vipers vs nantex spam.

3 hours ago, Pewpewpew BOOM said:

I really don’t like brussel sprouts, but I would prefer eating one to consuming a rabbit pellet. However, I chose to eat neither for dinner tonight.

Perhaps we just operate from a different frame of reference. For me, the SW genre looms large when I think about and play this game. I can’t envision Vader casually touring a ring of asteroids with his buddies and NOT engaging rebels easily in blaster range.

Sure, one could say that Vader is letting them go as part of a larger trap - which is great fodder for a book, movie, or RPG. However, this is a dogfighting game patterned after SW dogfights which Lucas said where inspired by WWII dogfights! I don’t think they really were going for IDs in the Battle of Britain, Midway, etc.

Agree, though you'll get abstractions in anything that's made into a game; intent and genre can be hard to condense down into pieces of plastic and cardboard that you move around on a table. I think FFG did very nearly as well as they could, but there will always be (and always be room for) the tactical-minded whose creativity in the game transcends the genre.

Maybe it's time to consider a scoring system like Armada. Margin of victory earning points.

It's not always perfect but it does reward bold play / aggressive battles.

Sitting in the edge of the map earns a draw which won't make the cut out of Swiss.

5 hours ago, Archangelspiv said:

I think that’s peoples issue with the stalling tactic. People can’t make superior engagements against this kind of list. If the viper player doesn’t want to engage where you are trying to make them, they don’t. They know full well they have 12 die coming in FS. Mitch even said earlier, he controls 2 table edges, it’s hard to flank that.

I guess what I keep feeling is that no one is entitled to a flank. Can't pull it off against some lists, well, the experience of a lot of casual night players. Lists have on-table counters. Just seems like folks tend to care more about it when 3-ship ace lists get countered. I mean, it just happens sometimes that lists have a advantage that can't be overcome. I recall flying Ion Cannon Scyks into B-Wings one time, and that doesn't work out in the B-Wings favor.

I say let folks work it out on the table. Maybe folks can find ways to win, maybe they can't, maybe they change their approach to list-building. Quad Starviper hasn't widely caught on. Maybe that's model availability, maybe it's the variance of 3-green dice. Quad Phantom was widespread, but to compare to Starviper, you had an extra agility, and a really strong jousting offense with the way that Juke stacked with other Jukes.

For years, we've been told "if both players are jousting, someone is making a mistake." We've been told "circle the drain for position." When someone applies those principles to a list of generic ships and pulls it off, can we really be mad at that? This is literally what we've been telling players is the right thing to do. Don't engage on your opponent's terms, engage on your own. I think in Duncan Howard's interview on the FBP, he literally said his goal is typically to try to make an opponent fight on his terms. That's what we all want to do, but not every list can do it against every other list, and that ought to be fine.

Just feels kinda dirty to change the rules at this point, to have judges step in and stop a list.

6 hours ago, Archangelspiv said:

[Grievous/Chertek/Ace/Ace]

I'm going a little off-topic, but for all the furor over Sun Fac, but Init 4 Nantex in large numbers are the things which really scare me. Under 50 points for something which can out-ace and out-control anything Init 3, or Init 4 and moving first (I'd go with @Ryuneke and cut Crack Shot for a baby-bid, since going second is so nice). Base-size isn't even that important, since these things are wicked dodgy, and bullseyes hit pretty hard.

5 hours ago, Vectivus333 said:

I think FFG did very nearly as well as they could, but there will always be (and always be room for) the tactical-minded whose creativity in the game transcends the genre.

I disagree. I think FFG chose the simplest solution to start with (whoever blows up the most points wins!) and have been dealing with the fallout ever since.

See unlimited time Championships that never end.

See players colluding to take intentional draws an locking up the cut.

See players point tanking with ridiculous bids then running to time.

Basically, FFG started with a beer-and-pretzel tabletop game with little (if any) thought into organized play and tournaments, players took it super serious and it became very successful, and they are attempting to make something work with what they have but have not put enough forethought into it and keep getting gamed by the players. Which is really sad considering there are so many examples of games with better win conditions that they could have borrowed from.

3 hours ago, kris40k said:

I disagree. I think FFG chose the simplest solution to start with (whoever blows up the most points wins!) and have been dealing with the fallout ever since.

See unlimited time Championships that never end.

See players colluding to take intentional draws an locking up the cut.

See players point tanking with ridiculous bids then running to time.

Basically, FFG started with a beer-and-pretzel tabletop game with little (if any) thought into organized play and tournaments, players took it super serious and it became very successful, and they are attempting to make something work with what they have but have not put enough forethought into it and keep getting gamed by the players. Which is really sad considering there are so many examples of games with better win conditions that they could have borrowed from.

I think you touched on something important in the last paragraph. Whatever game you design it's not going to be one that makes both the casuals and competitives happy. Because I'm assuming nobody is playing with Stalling Vipers at their beer and pretzels hang out.

If you make an ironclad rule set just to block some competitive edge cases it's going to drive away casuals.

The goliaths of the world will always cry that slings are unfair and should be banned.

Notice that none of these players/TOs threatened to ban quad phantom players that used this exact same strategy. And when an Imperial/Republic aces player constantly flies away from you for consecutive turns until they can use their perfect board information and double-reposition into a range 1 uncontested shot, they call it "skill", but when someone does it with low initiative ships that don't have the advantage of perfect board informatation, they cry that it's broken.

1 hour ago, Tvboy said:

Notice that none of these players/TOs threatened to ban quad phantom players that used this exact same strategy.

I think part of what's causing TOs to look hard at the quad StarViper's ability to stall is exactly because they recognise it from the quad Phantom lists. Quad Phantoms stopped being an issue due to points increases before the recent rules update about exploiting a stalemate, otherwise I think it would have got similar push-back. (Although the ability to stall wasnt the only issue with the quad TIE Phantom list by far...)

8 hours ago, Kushielrdf said:

Maybe it's time to consider a scoring system like Armada. Margin of victory earning points.

It's not always perfect but it does reward bold play / aggressive battles.

Sitting in the edge of the map earns a draw which won't make the cut out of Swiss.

I've got a lot of fondness for the Armada scoring system. As you say, it isn't perfect, but it does generally encourage you to actively play the game and try to score as many points as possible. The difference between a close win and a decisive victory is very significant in terms of tournament progression.

17 minutes ago, Jarval said:

I've got a lot of fondness for the Armada scoring system. As you say, it isn't perfect, but it does generally encourage you to actively play the game and try to score as many points as possible. The difference between a close win and a decisive victory is very significant in terms of tournament progression.

The massive issue with the scoring system with Armada is you can win 3 games, and finish second to a player who only won 2. It’s not a great scoring system.

3 minutes ago, Archangelspiv said:

The massive issue with the scoring system with Armada is you can win 3 games, and finish second to a player who only won 2. It’s not a great scoring system.

That's a fair point, although that might be a feature rather than a bug. If you've had two massive wins and a very close loss, is that a worse performance than someone who's won three games very closely?

9 minutes ago, Jarval said:

That's a fair point, although that might be a feature rather than a bug. If you've had two massive wins and a very close loss, is that a worse performance than someone who's won three games very closely?

In any sport a win is a win, so yes 3 wins is better than 2 and a close one.

I think anyone would feel cheated if this happens. You can submarine your first game to get a better draw. Own the second and hope you can pull a 7/8 victory in the last. Should net you 22 points which puts you in a commanding position.

4 minutes ago, Archangelspiv said:

In any sport a win is a win, so yes 3 wins is better than 2 and a close one.

To nit-pick a little, that's not the case for every sport - Formula 1 for example uses a points scoring system per race, with the overall champion being the driver with the most points at the end of the season.

28 minutes ago, Archangelspiv said:

In any sport a win is a win, so yes 3 wins is better than 2 and a close one.

I concur. In every classification single gold medal is worth more than 10 silver ones.

I don't understand why this thread is still going.

The only issue is the Starviper's chassis. Like the TIE Phantom is a bit cheap (and I think the latter is better).

I play aces and we have an edge against low initiative pilots. If my opponent plays conservatively within the rules, i have to take risks. He are playing fine and forcing to over-commit.

The deployment and first turns of Mitch are easy to perform? Well, I think that arc-dodge against low initiative pilots is easy too.

Playing aces, the difficulty is to engage in the right moment and run when you may lose an expensive ship.

I think Duncan Howard had a bad matchup and didn't make the right choices. He lost very soon the Punisher without making a lot of damage and Mitch went ahead on points easy. The good trade was Jendon, not Redline.

Finally, congrats to Mitchell Raab for an amazing performance.