AT6 G00dfellas Strategy Analysis

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Original text by Al'ar Darkwind, July 2009.

G00DFELLAS had a strategy that found the key to the Alliance Tournament: balance. What allowed them to do so well was the almost perfect balance of tank, damage, range and speed that gave them the ability to fight off almost every single type of setup that was fielded in the Tourny.

• Tank: the Nighthawks are legendary for having a very strong, local tank that allowed G00D to apply damage for long periods before losing even one. The dampeners of the Ishkurs increased this tank against longer range setups, especially in the beginning of each match, allowing G00D to be nearly untouched for a minute before damage was applied. Speed also factors into their tank but I am putting it into a separate category.

• Damage: Each Nighthawk was putting out very respectable DPS, and when added to the Ishkurs, was able to break every tank on the field in a reasonable amount of time.

• Speed and Range: While many high tank/DPS setups are battleships, using MWDing battlecruisers instead allowed G00D to dictate range on the enemy in most occasions adding an additional element of survivability. For example they were able to outspeed heavy drones, out-track sentries, and delay being caught by close range groups relying on their own speed.

Having missiles was crucial in this as well. No matter what range the enemy was from them they could rely on their ability to do full DPS from anywhere on the field unlike turret based strategies which would have been crushed in similar situations such as when they were scrammed and webbed or were being forced a great distance from the enemy to shake off damage.

AT6 Day 1 Fight 13
G00DFELLAS (Won)
6x Nighthawks, 2x Malus
Vs BLACK
4x Drakes, 1x Nighthawk, 1x Vulture, 2x Kitsune, 2x Griffin

BLACK putting shield rep drones on the Kitsunes was a really good idea and they managed to keep them alive for a decent amount of time allowing BLACK to put full fire on GOOD while G00D was focusing 100% of their DPS on the Kitsune. This was a good start.

What made BLACK lose is the fact that Drakes and Vultures put out ZERO DPS and therefore were not able to kill the Nighthawks of GOOD while the Nighthawks had a strong tank with decent DPS allowing them to actually kill the enemy team meanwhile tanking the BLACK dps with relative ease. I do however question G00DFELLAS target calling at the beginning of the match were damage was fairly spread out, with better prioritization they probably wouldn't have lost any Nighthawks (though I believe one was a disconnect or boundary violation).

(By the way, the commentators for this match were idiots. BLACK had no hope of wining, all they had was tank. Yet the commentators kept going on how BLACK should have won... Someone is in love *gag*)

AT6 Day 3 Fight 13
G00DFELLAS
2x Apocalypse, 2x Megathron, 1x Tempest, 2x Maulus
Vs HUZZAH FEDERATION
6x Ishtar, 4x Stilleto (Won)

Not a Nighthawk setup but I decided to include this anyways since we have all of G00Ds other matches and their setup was...interesting. I also believe it shows a setup that focused too much on one concept that is fairly easy to counter and is easily taken out by many common setups.

First bringing the 2 Maulus was completely useless as they had no way to stay alive, no speed, no tank, no remote reps making for a useless ship that is a waste of points. For the rest of their ships I think this could have worked well if they had remote cap boosted local reppers with Apocolypses or Rokhs instead of making the Tempest and Megathrons into a sniping platform, something that neither of them are.

HUZZAH's setup meanwhile was able to tank the incoming DPS once they got out at range where the combo of dampeners from Stilletos and distance protected them from the damage. This combo can be seen working as an Ishtar melted at the beginning of the fight but once damps went on the to the Battleships the Ishtars were able to tank the damage fairly well.

AT6 Day 5 Fight 6
G00DFELLAS (Won)
5x Nighthawks, 5x Ishkurs
Vs Blade
7x Ishtars, 1x Maulus

The speed and tank won this match very nicely for G00D this round. With the MWD the Nighthawks were able to mostly outspeed the heavy drones of the Ishtars. While they were pulling drones around the arena they were still able to apply their damage.

With half of the match over the Ishtars pulled the heavy drones and dropped Bouncers which allowed them to kill a Nighthawk but I believe that even if the Ishtars had deployed sentries from the start they would not have been able to break the solid tank of the Nighthawks. It would have been a closer match, but I really don't think Blade would have won.

AT6 Day 6 Fight 3
G00DFELLAS (Won)
5x Nighthawks, 5x Ishkurs
Vs Dead Terrorists
2x Abbadon, 1x Myrmidon, 5x Stabber Fleet Issue, 1x Republic Fleet Firetail

The Dampners of G00Ds setup won the round for them. When the match started the Ishkurs were able to damp down the Abbadons to prevent damage from reaching the Nighthawks as well as being able to MWD away from the Abbadons. This allowed G00D to take out all but one of the Stabbers before losing a Nighthawk. However G00D had lost their last Ishkur as the 2nd to last Dead Stabber entered armor allowing the Myrmidon to damp down the Nighthawks throughout the rest of the match, creating a need for them to get closer to the Abbadons. This shows the power of keeping your damping ships alive for a good portion of the match.

What almost got G00D in this fight was Dead's combo of the Firetail w/ scram taking out the Nighthawk's MWD then the Abbadons closing range via MWD and webbing the Nighthawks down, allowing the Abbadons to get and keep optimal. With the Nighthawks as spread out as they were though the Abbadons were capping themselves out with the combination of MWD and lasers which is shown in the end with the HeroHawk not taking any damage because the Abbadon ran out of Cap Booster 800s and had to scoop some from a wreck to keep his guns running.

However the balanced tank and DPS of the Nighthawks eventually showed up in the match allowing a single Nighthawk to take out the last Abbadon solo.

AT6 Day 6 Fight 10
G00DFELLAS (Won)
5x Nighthawks, 4x Ishkurs, 1x Ares
Vs The Five
2x Nighthawks, 3x Sleipnir, 5x Ishkurs

Basically the Sleipnir tank was completely pathetic and the 3 Sleipnirs melted under the fire from Goodfella team. With the Sleipnirs down The Five had little DPS left and G00D was able to burn down the rest of Five's team at their leisure. Dampeners didn't play much of a role here as the fight was very close range.

Lesson to take from here is that tank is greater than gank as you might get 200-400 extra DPS out of a gank ship but in the long run you would have done better if that ship could stay in the battle for 30 secs- 1 min giving more DPS in the long run. Of course you do need to balance, too much tank and you can't kill anything (like BLACK in G00DFELLAS first match).

AT6 Day 6 Fight 13
G00DFELLAS
5x Nighthawks, 4x Ishkurs, 1x Ares
Vs R.U.R. (Won)
1x Harbringer, 1x Hurricane, 1x Rapier, 4x Omen Navy Issue, 3x Rupture

This was a really, really close fight between two teams that each had an almost perfect mix of tank and damage.

I think strategy wise what cost G00D in this match is bringing the Ishkurs. Due to RURs close range setup there was really no need to have the dampners and they could have been better served with a 6th Nighthawk like they had in the first match. I believe what we could take away from this match is not being willing to change a setup even a little bit to counter a well known strategy of another team. Of course the warping into 0 on the arena didn't help either and a lot can be said of the ability to analyze an opponents strategy while looking at their ship types on scan and deciding where to warp in. And then the boundary violation that cost G00D their 2nd to last Nighthawk may have lost the match for them as well.

In this type of fight it is also vital to note G00Ds strategy of spreading out across the field as much as possible making R.U.R travel for long periods of time without being able to fire through the entire match allowing G00D to further reduce damage.

What is interesting about the RUR setup is that it appears to be an entire setup made of bait. The Navy Omens appear to be mostly gank, the Harbringer seems to be mostly gank, and so while the enemy tries to take out the Rapier and the Ruptures which were both heavily tanked, the Amarr ships are eating your team alive with damage. This is an interesting twist on the idea of balancing tank and gank and plays on an FCs knowledge of ships and their capabilities to squeeze the most damage out of the setup as possible while keeping a very strong tank.