Tuesday, January 16, 2018

POD#8 Preview

I was going to preview POD#1 first, but there's always one POD that is really excited to be playing Armada, and this year it looks like it is POD#8, so let's get them out of the way first.

 Click here to head to the home page for the tournament!

Here's the POD#8 Lists.  Analysis after the page break.


In Their Own Words:


Green Knight:  Peak performance IRL is winning Nordics (nationals) 2017. 2nd place in the last VWC (JJ whipped me good). I play in my home town and sometimes in a "nearby" town in Sweden. Small, but good local scene (took home 1st, 2nd and 4th in Nordics this year). And obviously on Vassal.

IrishMadCat:  Won 2 store championships in Ireland. Traveled to one European championships. 

rasproteus:  I play in vassal quite a bit.

Podracer:  A couple of seasonal tournament entries, no wins! there should be a forfeit for Letting me win!


Biggs' Analysis:


This is Green Knight's POD to lose.  He is by far the most experienced Vassal player in the POD, and has the distinction of being runner up in 2017 and winning his POD in 2016.  Plus his National title outranks everyone else in the POD.  Everyone else is relatively unknown, and could be a dark horse for the tournament, though rasproteus managed to get an early Mulligan's Island, and IrishMadCat sneaked in with the final Blackjack.  Podracer at least is known for playing his games, getting a "Close Enough" entry to make this a fully pre-qualified POD.

Green Knight starts the analysis out with a 6 activation, 383 bid, two combat ship list with Darth Vader as his commander, the only one to bring the Dark Lord of the Sith in this way.  A 90 point Demolisher hits close quarters, while a Cymoon Refit throws 6 rerollable Red dice out the front arc... and Devastator / Intel Officer means that it potentially will be throwing Blues from long range.  Even if it can't roll all hits, Intensify Firepower ensures a high floor for each attack.  4 Gozantis round out the list, with no squadron support.  His goal is going to be to hit fast and hard, but a squadron blob of bombers could ruin his day if he runs into a well run one.  With this in mind, IrishMadCat will be his toughest matchup.

Speaking of IrishMadCat, he has built a double Pelta Dodonna list, which is not... usual to put it mildly.  It's main form of damage is the 5 B-Wing compliment (4 generics plus Numb) that it pushes around with All Fighters Follow Me!, Fighter Coordination Team, and Yavaris.  Toryn Farr and a Bomber Command Center make this list a one trick pony, but one well designed to blow up any list that didn't tilt strongly against squadrons.  However, with only one source of Intel in Jan Ors, it has the possibility of being outflown.  With 9 drops, he has a strong deployment advantage, but nothing to really take advantage of it.  His bid is the worst of the POD at 398.  His worst matchup is Podracer from a purely list building perspective.

rasproteus has an interesting list that seems to fit in the middle of the road for this POD.  His 8 deployments aren't quite the best, nor is his 386 bid.  But he has a lot of combat ships.  Garel's Honor can both ram and unload a decent amount of damage.  2 MC30s are the heaviest hitters, and a CR90A with Turbolaser Reroute Circuits is able to put out a lot of long range damage.  He also has a limited squadron compliment to slow his opponents down, and hopefully earn back more points than he spent putting them out.  Tycho and Shara are small squadron standards, and 2 extra A-Wings offer some backup to both of them.  His worst matchup is probably Irish, who outdeploys him and has enough B-Wings to really hurt anything trying to get close.

Podracer rounds things out with a low 395 bid, but a solid Bomber list that attempts to get the Bomber on target by swatting other squadrons out of the sky.  Unfortunately, his anti-squadron investments are worthless against Green Knight, and underwhelming against the middle-of-the-road CAP brought by rasproteus.  He also has no true combat ships, with each ship being in some way a delivery vehicle for his squadrons.  His worst matchup is a Green Knight tanking his bomber's attacks, and ripping through his fleet.


Biggs' Bet:


Winner:  Green Knight
Runnerup:  IrishMadCat

I think Green Knight is unlikely to fail, even with two bomber heavy lists stacked against him, and if he does against one of them he stanches the bleeding enough to still take overall winner.  IrishMadCat's B-Wings have the best chance of the two of stopping Green Knight, and I think his skill probably beats out Pod's in the matchup there.  I'm not sure his list wins BIG though, like Green Knight's can, so I'll go so far as to say he wins all 3 games, but still settles into the runner up slot after Green Knight sweeps his other 2 games.


Truthiness's Bet:

I have to agree this pod is Green Knight's for the taking. His use of the Cymoon will likely define the pod. The list is setup entirely to take advantage of Devastator, Intel Officer, and Vader. Watch for him to Intel Officer whichever of his own defense tokens Vader decides to spend (yes, you can do that) to start stacking Devastator's effect early. The rest of the list is just padding and pressure. Demolisher is too dangerous to ignore, but that's the point: Green probably wants his opponent to prioritize Demolisher so that Devastator can...devastate.

IrishMadCat's squadrons could take advantage of Green's lack of squads, but Irish's lack of speed is going to really hurt against Green's Cymoon. Those Peltas are sitting ducks. Podracer's Sloane lacks enough punch to seriously threaten Green's Cymoon. If anyone is going to knock off Green, I think it's going to be rasproteus. He has the speed and manueverability to dodge around and some interesting little gimmicks that could give Green fits. Garel's Honor with Dodonna and Boarding Engineers is one hell of a nuisance. Admo is Demolisher's kryptonite. Finally, those H9s could pick off Green's activation padding quickly.

Shmitty's Bet:

No time for Shmitty to post anything, games are already starting in POD8!  Watch them on Vassal!  Or check out the result thread here.

3 comments:

  1. I messed up somethign terrible against green knight. I should never haver run this list with this little pratice and I regret everything :)

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    Replies
    1. Cymoon is horrible vs small ships. Against a flotilla I need 1 acc and 5 hit or 2 acc and 4 hits. Not guaranteed, but even wo CF it happens quite often. After that you were doomed, I think. Bees don't do dmg fast enough vs ISD with no TF/BCC.

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