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Data and Dice > Blog > Tournaments > 2023 US Masters Results
Tournaments

2023 US Masters Results

By Trevor
Last updated: 2024-06-13 5:48 pm
By Trevor
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Leading up to the US Masters, I compiled an analysis of all the participating lists, breaking them down by various factors such as drops, scoring drops, unit strength, average speed, and more. The question was: would any of these factors actually predict the tournament outcomes? Were there any bogeyman lists that were legitimate concerns? Now that we have the tournament data, we can find out! I extracted the data from Tabletopscore, analyzed it with Python,1 and here’s what I found. First, let’s take a look at the player results:

PlayerFactionWinsLossesDrawsAvgScoreElo
Luke FraserTrident Realm50116.71760
Jeffrey SchiltgenOgres50115.51722
Jeff RadiganForces Of Nature51015.01690
Jeff O’NealGoblins51013.81687
Nathan ClevengerNightstalkers51014.81686
Sean TroyRatkin51014.01673
Justin RobbinsOgres51014.01667
Keith RandallElves41113.01620
Mark CoxNorthern Alliance41112.21614
Kevin DruryVarangur42013.21603
Eric SchaeferElves42013.01597
Dustin HowardEmpire Of Dust42012.31577
Jordan BraunForces Of Nature42012.51569
Jared HolcombGoblins42010.21569
Keith MonachSalamanders42012.81565
Marcelo RoucoGreen Lady32113.71563
Grant FetterBasileans42011.21559
Erich TrowbridgeDwarfs32112.21558
Shawn PolkaForces Of Nature42010.51558
Dale MotleyDwarfs42011.51553
Michael SiglerForces Of The Abyss42010.81543
Cory WalizerOgres32111.81539
Jesse BerglundElves42010.51530
Tom AnnisDwarfs33012.21520
Jon BeckerOgres33011.71513
Joseph BorgeseDwarfs32110.21506
Kyle PietschDwarfs33010.81501
Garrett MercierSalamanders33012.31498
Mike RossiDwarfs33011.51496
Mike GrantHerd33011.51489
Nicholas MurrayUndead33010.51486
Jason BirrElves33010.81483
Dustin ChurchHerd33010.71477
Tyler SchulzEmpire Of Dust3309.81475
Ryan MunsellDwarfs3309.71470
Alex ChavesDwarfs23110.71460
Ray WeiandtForces Of The Abyss3309.71456
Eldon Jr KroschGoblins33010.01456
Timothy SmithUndead33010.31455
Devlin SmithSylvan Kin2319.81448
Billy HenningerTrident Realm3309.01442
Jesse GarrettForces Of The Abyss24011.01433
Brinton WilliamsAbyssal Dwarfs2409.01399
Daniel WrightHalflings2409.51394
Bruce MonachUndead24010.31392
Brian RingElves2408.21384
Cyle PoolGoblins2408.81384
Lex SimonBasileans2408.21373
Bryce ClarkForces Of The Abyss2407.81368
Blake RobertsonNightstalkers2407.51367
Daniel JohnsonForces Of Nature2408.51366
Jared McclureTrident Realm2407.81366
Benjamin McclureAbyssal Dwarfs2408.01365
Ryan SmithNorthern Alliance2407.21364
Stephen DeroseVarangur2408.01363
Russell RomanoElves2406.01354
Kenneth HeislerOrcs2406.81352
William SteinForces Of The Abyss2407.01326
Benjamin WeisertOgres1505.81304
John BlakemoreDwarfs1508.31298
Andrew MintonSalamanders1506.81286
Lance HatcherSalamanders1506.71276
Benjamin StoddardForces Of The Abyss1506.31271
Nate MurrayOgres0603.31121

If you’re not familiar with Elo ratings, it’s a system commonly used in one-on-one games like chess. Essentially, your rating is compared to your opponent’s before the match. If you perform better than expected, your rating increases and vice versa. This means that a narrow loss against a strong opponent can actually increase your rating, while a less-than-impressive win against a weaker opponent can decrease your rating.

So, which factors in the army lists had the most significant impact on the outcomes? To find out, I performed a correlation analysis to see which factors were most strongly associated with the final Elo ratings. The results were enlightening:

  • Number of Nimble Units: Kings of War is a game of movement, so each nimble unit adds flexibility and opportunity. This factor had a positive correlation with Elo rating.
  • Number of Missile Units: These are individuals used to kill war machines or ground flyers. Surprisingly, the more of these a player had, the lower their Elo rating.
  • Total Amount of Regen: This factor had a negaptive correlation with Elo rating. It might be a spurious correlation due to the limited sample size, but it suggests that having a lot of regen units isn’t necessarily a winning strategy.
  • Number of Chaff Units: The more chaff units a player had, the better their charges, which can be critical in the piece trading game.
  • Number of Total Ranged Attacks: While damage output is important, being able to attack enemies from a distance before engaging in close combat seemed to pay dividends against a tough masters field.

Next, I aggregated the data by faction:

FactionWinsLossesDrawsWinPctAvgScoreElo
Ratkin5100.83014.01673
Green Lady3210.50013.71563
Forces Of Nature15900.62011.61546
Nightstalkers7500.58011.21527
Empire Of Dust7500.58011.11526
Goblins141000.58010.71524
Trident Realm10710.56011.21523
Elves191610.53010.21495
Northern Alliance6510.5009.71489
Dwarfs252630.46010.81485
Herd6600.50011.11483
Varangur6600.50010.61483
Ogres171720.47010.41478
Basileans6600.5009.71466
Sylvan Kin2310.3309.81448
Undead81000.44010.41444
Salamanders91500.3809.71406
Forces Of The Abyss142200.3908.81400
Halflings2400.3309.51394
Abyssal Dwarfs4800.3308.51382
Orcs2400.3306.81352

With small player counts, the data can be somewhat skewed, but it’s probably not surprising to see the Forces of Nature (FoN) with such a strong showing. The Forces of the Abyss had a tough time, going 0-5 against Goblins over the weekend. In fact, they only managed winning records against two factions: Abyssal Dwarfs (1-0) and Salamanders (4-1). Marcelo’s Order of the Green Lady performed exceptionally well, despite having fewer drops and less unit strength. Does this suggest that unit strength has been overrated? It doesn’t seem to correlate much with the final Elo rating (0.07, which means it had virtually no effect).

The box plot above provides a visual representation of each faction’s performance. The larger the bars, the greater the spread in performance, which suggests that individual player skill, rather than faction match-ups, might be a significant driver of results.

So, what are the key takeaways?

  1. There isn’t a strong correlation between pre-tournament stats and tournament outcomes. Factors such as player skill, scenarios, and individual match-ups likely play a larger role in determining performance than any specific combination of list attributes.
  2. There’s significant variation both within and between factions. While it’s difficult to draw firm conclusions with limited data points, the data suggest that player skill, rather than faction selection, is the primary determinant of tournament outcomes.
  3. With one exception, Dwarf players’ performance was tightly clustered. This is in line with what most players would expect. The Dwarfs, with their slow speed, decent damage output, and high resilience, are a forgiving faction to play. They offer opportunities to minimize the impact of player skill, but at the expense of top outcomes. On the other hand, factions with wide performance variability like Ogres, Trident Realm, and Salamanders likely depend more heavily on player skill to drive results.

In short, while list composition and faction selection can influence outcomes, player skill (along with scenarios and match-ups) determines success in Kings of War. List building matters, but at the highest level, there’s very little correlation between list attributes and success. To all the aspiring Masters out there, remember that while studying your lists and analyzing your factions is important, honing your tactical skills and understanding of the game’s nuances matters more.

Keep practicing, keep learning, and I look forward to seeing how you shake up the stats in the next tournament!

1Note that the results were pulled from tabletopscore, which gave the score results but not the w-l-d results. This means that some games that ended in draws but had different levels of points are represented as wins and losses rather than draws. If you have a better source of data, please let me know, and I can update this analysis.

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