A New Armada Meta!

 A New Armada Meta!

And while I've no idea what it looks like, I'm really excited to get into it!

That's not entirely true. Courtesy of Karnack and the Las Vegas Open (LVO), we have at least some info on what people are flying. It's a little isolated and may not be indicative of the wider Armada community, but it's new info and I'll take it. There are plenty of people who can break down the data way better than I ever could, so I'm not going to do that here. It'll just frustrate me as I try and wrangle numbers, and then it'll just frustrate you because it won't tell you the things you want to know. So I'm just going to share a couple of observations and things I'm thinking about.

1. People don't think CW factions can compete.
1. I think the majority of us were very excited to get our hands on two new factions. Then we did and we played with them, and we haven't heard of any upcoming releases. I know some people just got bitter and complained. I'm not talking about those people because, you know, whatever. We're in the middle of a pandemic, the switchover to AMG from FFG was quick and looks as though it wasn't handled well, and ultimately, you can complain all you want, but really, the only thing you can do is stop buying the game. If you don't like it, then just stop buying it. I'm not sure what to tell you. If you think you can do it better, get yourself hired there or start your own company and make enough money that you can buy the Star Wars license out from under Asmodee.
   Those people looking for an excuse to complain aside, I think a lot of us have played Republic or Separatists or both and want *just a little more* in terms of options. Some more squadron choices, a fifth ship option, that sort of thing. It's easy to see why when we compare CW factions to the Rebels and Imperials, as they have 11 and 10 ships, respectively (to say nothing of the fact that the Imperial Star Destroyer has 4 chassis instead of the usual 2). They also have double the squadron options (not counting aces, of which they have even more). It seems that because people feel constricted by CW faction builds, they've also decided those factions can't compete at the higher levels.
   LVO featured 40 participants: 18 Imperial players, 13 Rebel players, and then only 9 total CW players - 5 fielding GAR fleets, 4 competing with the Separatist faction. That's absolutely an indictment of the perceived ability of the new factions to hold up against the old ones. The Top 16 Final Standings featured 9 Imperial fleets, 3 Rebel fleets, 3 GAR fleets, and only 1 Separatist fleet. The first appearance of a CW faction is in sixth place, with Joseph N. fielding Separatists. Erik M. slipped into the Top 10 with a GAR fleet.
   I can see a lot of the limitations in playing CW factions and I know a lot of people feel hemmed into only a couple of different archetypes that they can fly. I definitely appreciate that there are far more options with the Rebels and Imperials. But I do think Clone Wars factions are more competitive than perhaps some people think. It makes me want to fly my Luminara fleet at Adepticon next month, but I also feel as though I still have something to prove with Grand Moff Tarkin. So while both fleets will be prepped for March, I can't imagine I'll want to fly anything other than Tarkin after all the work I put into him just before COVID-19 shut everything down for a couple of years.
2. Onagers are going to be extremely prevalent until they're nerfed in one form or another.
1. There were 7 fleets featuring Onagers at the LVO out of the 18 Imperial fleets people brought. That's a little less than 50% of the total Imperial fleets that featured at least one Onager. Most of them were Testbeds. Now that organized play (OP) is ramping up and there are higher stakes (see: tickets to Worlds), I think people are going to play for keeps. And that means people are more likely to lean toward *safer* fleet builds that are more likely to get them to the top. I'm not the first person to make this observation, but yeah, we're gonna see a lot of Onagers until they're nerfed in some way, shape, or form. So be ready for that. Even if you're only going up against a single Onager, if it's boasting some Accuracy tech, that's gonna be an uphill climb for most fleets.
   
   
   
3. Accuracy tech and counter-tech is vital.
1. Speaking of Accuracy tech, it's huge. So much huger than it was prior to the 1.5 rule changes. None of the Clone Wars faction ships have redundant defense tokens (with the exception of a Republic Pelta sporting the TB-73 title). And we know Onagers love Accuracies anyway to lock down those pesky Evades at extreme range. I prefer Early Warning System to Electronic Countermeasures. Always have. But I swapped out EWS for ECM on my Kuat after getting annihilated by Ravager builds. And I've kept it that way despite the nerf to Ravagers in 1.5. Why? Because Accuracy tech is still very prevalent and can be devastating. So I think we'll see lots of Accuracy tech, and so the need for that Accuracy counter-tech is high.
4. I'm looking forward to seeing more generic squadrons out there!
1. I don't know if this is a thing that happens, but given the new restrictions on unique squadrons with defense tokens, I think we're going to see a lot more fleets featuring generic squadrons out there. This happened from time to time, such as with Sloane and TIE Interceptors or Rebel fleets that spammed YT-2400s. And we'll still see those, for sure. But I think far more people will be pushed into a fleet building space that features more generic squadrons. At LVO, there were 40 people competing. Of those 40 people and their fleets, a whopping 23 of those fleets featured multiple generic squadrons. Of the remaining 17 fleets, 10 of those ran without squadrons. That's right - there were only 7 fleets at LVO (of 40) that flew squadrons and didn't have multiple generic squadrons. That, to me, is so cool! I think it'll foster more creativity and I think it leads to more *realistic* squadron battles instead of the majority of fleets featuring a squadron contingent that is composed exclusively of aces. AND we might get to see more named squadrons without defense tokens, such as Green or Tempest!
   
5. The unpredictability after 2 years away will lead to a bit of a Wild West atmosphere for awhile.
1. Metas evolve independently of each other with the same materials when there is no connection between those metas. When we have OP events, there's shared data out there between metas. We in St. Louis know what folks in Canada and beyond are flying because there's a general meta as well as a local one, and we have the data to back it up. Players start to either build on what other players have created or straight up copy whatever they've made and rode to victory. But we had a bunch of releases during the pandemic and an absence of OP. But people kept playing Armada. A lot of people played online and so there is that sort of general meta that had evolved during the pandemic. But a lot of us just...didn't. And so local metas evolved differently. I think some things remain true, such as Onagers being very common until they're nerfed. But I also think the next couple of OP events will feature some pretty wild ideas because we're all coming from different metas that were more likely to evolve in a vacuum. I think it's gonna be fun!
   
   I said what I said.