1 and a half hours until LVO finals takes place.

You can watch live at

Www.youtube.com/Swaestarwarsarmadaexplained

I'll post again when its about to start.

starting in 15 minutes!

12 hours ago, MandalorianMoose said:

Intel is rampant in my area and fairly important to let MMJ bomb ships

Grrrr....

So we've the infernal loop of paper-rock-scissors hard counters. Have to bring ATN to counter Intel, because your enemy has Intel to bomb with MMJ, except if you have ATN then adding Dengar to his list was 20 points wasted so he leaves him out, which means your ATN is wasted so you leave that out, so Intel is useful again and it gets added back, etc et al.

Wonderful.

30 minutes ago, xanderf said:

Grrrr....

So we've the infernal loop of paper-rock-scissors hard counters. Have to bring ATN to counter Intel, because your enemy has Intel to bomb with MMJ, except if you have ATN then adding Dengar to his list was 20 points wasted so he leaves him out, which means your ATN is wasted so you leave that out, so Intel is useful again and it gets added back, etc et al.

Wonderful.

Having things as a choice and a Meta-call is kinda healthy.

Its certainly worse when there's only one option to choose.

5 hours ago, xanderf said:

Grrrr....

So we've the infernal loop of paper-rock-scissors hard counters.

This is the nature of reality, surely?

Choice begets consequence.

Enemy has lots of cavalry, bring pikes and form square. Enemy has lots of infantry in squares? Bring cannon. Enemy has lots of cannon? Bring light cavalry to skirmish, flank, destroy. Enemy has lots of light cav? Bring heavy cav to charge and destroy. Enemy has lots of heavy cav? Bring infantry with pikes and form square.

I refer you to Machiavelli’s other book: The Art of War.

6 hours ago, xanderf said:

Grrrr....

So we've the infernal loop of paper-rock-scissors hard counters. Have to bring ATN to counter Intel, because your enemy has Intel to bomb with MMJ, except if you have ATN then adding Dengar to his list was 20 points wasted so he leaves him out, which means your ATN is wasted so you leave that out, so Intel is useful again and it gets added back, etc et al.

Wonderful.

At least you have multiple choices.
You can use full squadrons against the enemy squadrons, or you can use few, combined with an ATN, just to protect your ships. Or no squadrons at all, but use flak/counter for it.
I like it, that they give different way to handle a threat. better than just one.

It is more Rock, Paper, Scissor, Lizard, Spock. Or the little more extreme version .

7 hours ago, xanderf said:

Grrrr....

So we've the infernal loop of paper-rock-scissors hard counters. Have to bring ATN to counter Intel, because your enemy has Intel to bomb with MMJ, except if you have ATN then adding Dengar to his list was 20 points wasted so he leaves him out, which means your ATN is wasted so you leave that out, so Intel is useful again and it gets added back, etc et al.

Wonderful.

I’ll never understand this kind of attitude. People have been complaining about intel since its launch, FFG gives us *the* counter to intel, and now we’re complaining about that....

1 hour ago, MandalorianMoose said:

I’ll never understand this kind of attitude. People have been complaining about intel since its launch, FFG gives us *the* counter to intel, and now we’re complaining about that....

Absolutely, Moose. Yeah, I get that it can feel kind of crappy in a particular meta wherein I HAVE to bring a particular upgrade because EVERYONE is flying *this list*. But overall, isn't this the way it's supposed to be working? And as multiple people pointed out, there are build options. No one is locked into anything. If any of us are still struggling to work around Intel, there's plenty of good advice online on how to handle it. But bottom line? If I spent 5 points and a mod to stop indiscriminate bombing of my ship? ****, man, I'll take that trade every day of the week because my card and slot aren't "wasted": they did what I wanted them to.

Btw. @MandalorianMoose , so sad, that you lost the final match. It was such a close game, and it always hurt, when it is decided by one damage. And it is even worse, that this might only lead to more CR90/Raider lifeboats, to prevent getting tabled.
But i like your list, and the idea how to handle the enemy squadrons. I assume they were helping quite well against the heavy squadron games in the swiss rounds 😉 .

2 hours ago, Tokra said:

Btw. @MandalorianMoose , so sad, that you lost the final match. It was such a close game, and it always hurt, when it is decided by one damage. And it is even worse, that this might only lead to more CR90/Raider lifeboats, to prevent getting tabled.
But i like your list, and the idea how to handle the enemy squadrons. I assume they were helping quite well against the heavy squadron games in the swiss rounds 😉 .

I know, such a bummer 😕 Mike flew very well and I thought I had it at the end but Lando’s luck ran out and wasn’t able to remove the ACM I needed to. And yes I was able to farm pretty much everyone’s squadrons during Swiss, but there was just too much ship threat on the board in that final match! Couldn’t grind them down fast enough with the bombers. Especially after BCC got run over and my bomber dice got cold quick

6 minutes ago, MandalorianMoose said:

I know, such a bummer 😕 Mike flew very well and I thought I had it at the end but Lando’s luck ran out and wasn’t able to remove the ACM I needed to. And yes I was able to farm pretty much everyone’s squadrons during Swiss, but there was just too much ship threat on the board in that final match! Couldn’t grind them down fast enough with the bombers. Especially after BCC got run over and my bomber dice got cold quick

As @Karneck said during the stream. You were lacking the one navigation command on the Mark II to get it out of the range of the ISD.

But it was, after all, a great preformance and still a great result.

6 minutes ago, Tokra said:

As @Karneck said during the stream. You were lacking the one navigation command on the Mark II to get it out of the range of the ISD.

But it was, after all, a great preformance and still a great result.

Yea, I was debating one more Nav at the beginning there but really needed to make sure I killed a small base with squads before everything got to me, but alas I had to go in on Chimaera as that was the main threat presented to me. Even an engineering (my other thought) would have let me move some shields from the far side. I was also debating dropping to speed 1 with my token but was worried if I did he would just flak and run, winning on a few points from squads.

10 hours ago, Tokra said:

At least you have multiple choices.
You can use full squadrons against the enemy squadrons, or you can use few, combined with an ATN, just to protect your ships. Or no squadrons at all, but use flak/counter for it.

It does put you in the weird situation of the most cost-effective anti-fighter defense of a Star Destroyer...

...is equipping ATN and having a half dozen squadrons of TIE Bombers just flying around it as your CAP.

Which, I mean...??so thematic?? 🙄

5 minutes ago, xanderf said:

It does put you in the weird situation of the most cost-effective anti-fighter defense of a Star Destroyer...

...is equipping ATN and having a half dozen squadrons of TIE Bombers just flying around it as your CAP.

Which, I mean...??so thematic?? 🙄

Like THAT is the worst thematic blunder around... 😀

8 minutes ago, xanderf said:

It does put you in the weird situation of the most cost-effective anti-fighter defense of a Star Destroyer...

...is equipping ATN and having a half dozen squadrons of TIE Bombers just flying around it as your CAP.

Which, I mean...??so thematic?? 🙄

See I think that’s pretty cool. Facing squadronless? Cool my bombers will bomb ships. Facing a max squad list? Here’s 30 hull to chew on while my ships blow up your carriers

I was just noticing that the double sided plastic cards given to the top 32 are quite a bit bigger than the standard ship cards, by 3-5mm in each direction. Is just these cards? Or are all the plastic cards big like that?

11 minutes ago, MandalorianMoose said:

See I think that’s pretty cool. Facing squadronless? Cool my bombers will bomb ships. Facing a max squad list? Here’s 30 hull to chew on while my ships blow up your carriers

Oh, it definitely feels like it would be effective gameplay-wise. My complaint is merely that this resulting effect is thematically grotesque, and happens solely because a card was created to be a hard-counter to exactly one other thing (itself the poorly-conceived-in-the-first-place 'Intel' keyword).

Sacrificing theme for gameplay mechanics is...not my favorite choice.

24 minutes ago, Drasnighta said:

Like THAT is the worst thematic blunder around... 😀

Touché

14 minutes ago, bkcammack said:

I was just noticing that the double sided plastic cards given to the top 32 are quite a bit bigger than the standard ship cards, by 3-5mm in each direction. Is just these cards? Or are all the plastic cards big like that?

These two cards, and as well the Gozanti from the Prime Championships, are this big. They are about as big as a normal card with sleeve.
All older plastic cards had the same size as the normal ship cards. As far as i know, it is only these 3 cards that are bigger.

22 minutes ago, xanderf said:

Oh, it definitely feels like it would be effective gameplay-wise. My complaint is merely that this resulting effect is thematically grotesque, and happens solely because a card was created to be a hard-counter to exactly one other thing (itself the poorly-conceived-in-the-first-place 'Intel' keyword).

Sacrificing theme for gameplay mechanics is...not my favorite choice.

Gameplay > Theme 100 times over

28 minutes ago, Tokra said:

These two cards, and as well the Gozanti from the Prime Championships, are this big. They are about as big as a normal card with sleeve.
All older plastic cards had the same size as the normal ship cards. As far as i know, it is only these 3 cards that are bigger.

Plus the doubleside plastic ISD/MC80 from last years nationals. Is that the one you got, or did vegas hand out something else?

25 minutes ago, NewGandhi said:

Plus the doubleside plastic ISD/MC80 from last years nationals. Is that the one you got, or did vegas hand out something else?

LVO was the second US Grand after Nova(?), so it was the MC80/ISD2. MC30/Interdictor is the same, and seems the new Gozanti are aswell, so they might go for more durable cards.

I thought the LVO was a very fun tournament with a lot of really great people. We were able to play 4 rounds the first day which is tiring but awesome. But I also wish there had been a top 8 cut as well, especially since I finished 7th overall!

Name: Piett de Palazzo*
Faction: Imperial
Commander: Admiral Piett

Assault: Precision Strike
Defense: Fighter Ambush
Navigation: Superior Positions

Imperial II (120)
• Admiral Piett (22)
• Strategic Adviser (4)
• Gunnery Team (7)
• Expanded Hangar Bay (5)
• Electronic Countermeasures (7)
• Leading Shots (4)
• Linked Turbolaser Towers (7)
= 176 Points

Raider I (44)
• Iden Versio (6)
• Ordnance Experts (4)
• External Racks (3)
• Corvus (2)
= 59 Points

Gozanti Cruisers (23)
• Hondo Ohnaka (2)
• Comms Net (2)
= 27 Points

Squadrons:
• Darth Vader (21)
• Mauler Mithel (15)
• Dengar (20)
• Maarek Stele (21)
• 2 x TIE Defender Squadron (32)
• Major Rhymer (16)
• TIE Bomber Squadron (9)
= 134 Points

Total Points: 396

A few notes about my list:

- I brought bomber squads but placed a little too much focus on the anti-squads component of my fleet (esp. with Versio on the Corvus). I just really wanted to win the squad battle. Unfortunately, I only played ONE opponent with ANY squadrons!!

- I did not use my Raider effectively, esp w/ nothing to flak in 3 matches, not wanting to risk it much against the 4 ISDs, 1 SSD, and 1 MC80 I faced. I want to say I would have used it more aggressively but using it conservatively was essential in preventing a tabling in Round 4 (and an almost in Round 3 vs the SSD).

- I took Sovereign off my ISD, which would have been nice, BUT my small 4 point bid gave me the opportunity to choose 1st or 2nd player in my first 3 matches (which was ALWAYS crucial) and allowed my to tie the bid on my 4th match (where I won the roll for initiative). So that was good. I figured out that I still needed to dial in a squad command (usually on turn 3 anyway and use Piett’s ability on something else that turn.)

- Bomber Command was missed, but not horribly. This was Vegas after all and I decided to gamble on my dice!

- I fought my first SSD in tournament play and managed to win though a combination of skill and luck. Definitely took both. Very scary thing to face.

- Didn’t expect to face 2 different dual-long range ISD lists (Motti ISDII/Cymoon = Win! / Dual Chimaera/Sovereign ISDIIs = Loss!)

- I’ll post some match notes to the best of my recollection (and use of some pics) tomorrow (if I remember).

On 1/27/2020 at 12:16 PM, xanderf said:

Oh, it definitely feels like it would be effective gameplay-wise. My complaint is merely that this resulting effect is thematically grotesque, and happens solely because a card was created to be a hard-counter to exactly one other thing (itself the poorly-conceived-in-the-first-place 'Intel' keyword).

Sacrificing theme for gameplay mechanics is...not my favorite choice.

At least CAP makes sense again... that's a step forward.

12 minutes ago, The Jabbawookie said:

At least CAP makes sense again... that's a step forward.

"Now THERE is a fleet with an effective CAP!"

-- Someone at FFG, probably.