My disappointment with my performance has lowered a bit, so here's the "more info" I said I'd give.
24th out of 31, which isn't even as good of a bright side of "well you could be closer to the bottom" since a handful of people dropped, including the guy who was my pick as favorite to win (he won his first match, and decided half way through the second that he was dropping because he was testing some things with his list and felt like he didn't have enough offense).
My brain has been focused more on the Armada Store Championship coming up this Saturday, so I hadn't played X-Wing in the month prior to Saturday's X-Wing event. I didn't even know what I was going to fly until half an hour before I left the house to go to the tourney; I woke up at 4 after falling asleep on the couch and began toying around with some things in a squad builder. Registration started at 9, it's an hour drive so I needed to leave by 8, and it was definitely after 7:30 when I came up with the list right before hopping in the shower. I decided to run the following, which I have used before and may not be amazing with but I know it and have scored some wins with it:
-Miranda with TLT, C-3P0, Advanced SLAM
-Braylen Stramm with Gunner, Alliance Overhaul, and R3-A2
-Tarn Misen with M9-G8 and Integrated Astromech
Minutes after deciding on that, I decided that I missed bombs on a K-Wing with that list and felt like I have gotten really good with judging my SLAMs and dropping bombs. I needed some spare points though, so I also created the following list:
-Miranda with TLT, Sabine, Extra Munitions, Conner Net, Cluster Mines, and Advanced SLAM
-Braylen Stramm with Intelligence Agent, Alliance Overhaul, and R3-A2
-Ahsoka with VI, Sabine's Masterpiece, Captured TIE, Intelligence Agent, and EMP Device
The first list had a two point initiative bid (I sometimes throw Flechettes on there for the attempted triple stress) but to put bombs on Miranda, I needed to drop Gunner to something more affordable and lose the X-Wing. I went with Ahsoka and figured the Intel Agents on both her and Braylen would be good for knowing where people would be going if I didn't wanna drop bombs right on them, and the EMP Device would be good for setting people up for bombing runs. I took both lists into the store and immediately saw a guy I that I am friendly with and have played against. I showed him both lists and he said he thought the second was stronger, so I decided to go for it.
Round one was against a guy who wound up taking either third or four place. He drove up from two hours away and brought an Imperial list: Soontir Fel with the standard loadout except for Targeting Computer in place of Stealth Device, QuickDraw, and an Omega Leader. He was definitely really good. I pinned down Soontir but he traded him for my Miranda using his other ships. My other two went down quick and the only points I scored were from Soontir. 34-100
Round two was against a buddy of the first guy who rode up with him. He was playing a Rey/Poe list that had a couple differences than I'm used to but still had the regular white sloop-ing of Rey and regenerating Poe. I scored half points on Rey but lost all of my guys. 28-100
We broke for lunch, which was like an hour, and I stayed there and talked shop with some people. I spoke a lot with a guy who drives up from the same town as me and had just played two games at the streaming table, and then was talking to a cool dude about his triple ARC list and telling him about my desire to run a similar list but the disaster I had the first time I ran it. Then round three started. Round three was against a guy running a TIE/D Countess Ryad with Rage, a Night Beast, and Major Stridan. Stridan was helping pull the second rage off of Ryad when she would do a straight or Twin Ion Engine-backed soft turn and the Rage worked great with the tractor beam and primary shots on my 1AGI Rebel ships. I got half points on Stridan and went the distance but lost Miranda and couldn't get enough points elsewhere to win. 24-51
It was at this point that I began getting extremely worried. Like I said recently, I didn't even care about the prizes above top 32 (not to sound cocky like I thought I had a shot at them, I just didn't care for the rulers or Kallus token or Rey card), so I only wanted the Integrated/R2-D2 combo card for showing up and the Engine Upgrade. Luckily there was only 31 people and they went ahead and handed those two cards out in the second round, but I still wanted to win some matches. I've always assumed I'm a middle-of-the-road, not great but not awful either. I wanted to win up somewhere in the middle of the pack but it was in that third round that I started to get worried that I wouldn't win any.
So the fourth match comes up and I face a girl running Luke with Swarm Leader, Tycho, and 2X Green Squadron Pilots with Snap Shot and Trick Shot. She wound up taking out Stramm midway through the match and I became incredibly stressed out. I got Tycho down to almost dead early on but after Stramm died I wound up with no ships close to him. I got Luke down to almost dead but then had to worry about my remaining two ships staying alive, because Miranda had one hull left. Final Round was called and I was shooting a TLT shot at Luke with 1 less die from a crit. Final shot of the TLT and I roll only one hit. She blanks out on her dice and I barely snag a win, 35 to 28. After reporting the score and tearing down to await round 5's pairings, she was talking to someone she knew about how close it was and then said "Oh my god, that last shot was through an obstacle, right? I didn't roll for obstructed!" I didn't realize it during the attack because I was so focused on my attack. I confirmed it was obstructed and that she didn't roll an extra and then waited to see what would happen next, if she would shrug it off or ask to roll another die real quick to see if she would get an evade. I mean, if she had requested it, I wouldn't have said no, and if she had rolled an evade, I would have asked the TO if the score could be changed. He might not have even changed it, but at that point I was like "What's the difference anyway? I'm playing so horribly that a win isn't consoling to me at all right now." But I definitely wasn't going to suggest to her that she roll a free die real quick. She brushed it off (she definitely seemed irritated about forgetting it, which was understandable) and that was that. 35-28
Round five was against a BroBot list. I've never flown against one before, so I don't know how standard they were. It was IG-88B and C though. It was interesting to fly against them and B was PtL-ing a lot, which made him a good target for Stramm's stress. I also got a fantastic EMP Device off on both of them when they were facing each other and I was behind one, which led to them bumping into each other and not moving for a while. I failed to capitalize on that though. I got one down to only a few hull left and one down to one shield left and thought 'Maybe I can score half points on both?' but there was a lot of time left. My opponent then realized that my last shot from Stramm that took out three shield was actually against the shieldless one that had damage on him already. When they were tied up pointing each other and finally flew on and switched sides, he got them mixed up. I did as well, I guess. I mean, I shot at one and saw him assign damage cards and stuff on his side but I wasn't looking intently at which pilot he was assigning to. So he said "Hold up, I mixed these up. You didn't actually take three shields off of *this* one, you killed *this* one and the other one still has some shields. I was still confused but we played on. He took both Miranda and Stramm down to one hull each and time was called. I got 50 points for killing one IG and he got none. 50-0.
So yeah, that was my day. Three bad losses and two wins that I barely won and hardly got any points for. So pretty much a terrible showing. I know people have bad days, dice aren't with them sometimes (they were spcertainly with some of my opponents, like the guy who took three cluster bombs to a ship and only rolled one hit on them), these events draw good players from everywhere in the area, and more. All of that makes me know that my ranking didn't automatically mean I'm a terrible X-Wing player, but it did mean that I played terribly at that time and gave an awful showing. I had been awaiting this for a while too: my first Store Championship, my first "higher tier than a seasonal kit OP," my first time possibly getting to play with some Krayts and other high-profile players. And then it wound up like that. I played horribly and my list wasn't that great either. Two Rebel 1AGI ships, a "ship you can't shoot at!" that was capable of being shot at by a lot of aces," and more.
On the plus side, I got two cards out of it that I wanted, I got a Hornet Squadron sticker from some guys to put on my Armada case which is covered in SW stickers, and I got to meet two of the SlingPaint guys. I also got to meet some of the players from different places throughout the region. I'm trying to get over it.
Final four of the event was the guy I faced in round one (so Soontir Fel made it to top 4, wow), both SlingPaint guys (one playing triple K-Wings, the other flying a Protectorate which may have been Fenn Rau and two Jumpmasters with Attani and torps, and the guy who won it flying Assaj and Bossk. All non-locals, which was kind of a bummer too. Turn out was good and it was the busiest event I've ever been to. They were also doing 15% off of ships and mats for the event (they sold like 4 or 5 C-ROCs at 15% off). It was an interesting day, just wish it would have gone a bit more my way. If I had lost two and won three by points, or lost three, went to the loser tier, and then won decisively and stomped the last two opponents, that would have been one thing. But now I'm wondering a bit "Am I any good at all?" Sigh... At least I don't expect to do well at the Armada event this weekend and just want to play the game and get some loot, since I'm still so new at that game.
