You can view the updated spreadsheet here. Be sure to check individual tabs for each faction, and remember you can scroll down to see the raw data showing detailed matchup information per faction.
You can go find individual lists for the entire event here.
Since clicking through a spreadsheet isn't for everyone, I've decided to include some interesting highlights for each faction here. I've picked out which casters were actually played for each faction, as well as that casters individual win percentages - though this is only using Non-Mirror match games, so overall caster win percentage may not be completely accurate.
Some Big Ol' Caveats
Please keep in mind that while you can see a number of very high or low percentages, always remember to look at the total number of games played to get some context. Makeda2 may have a 100% win rate, but she's not the most overpowered caster in Skorne - she just played in only one game and happened to win it.
Conversely Trolls don't have zero game into Menoth because they have a 0% win rate against them. They simply matched up only once and Trolls lost that game.
At best we can draw only a few solid conclusions from all this data in each faction, though some general trends are definitely apparent that can be used to inform how you want to build lists and plan for factions going forward.
Just please remember to take all of this with a healthy grain of salt.
Overall Faction Performance
This isn't really new information since a graphic from the ATC was circulated earlier that showed win percentages for each faction in non-mirror matches, but I used that data as a check on my own transcription and came up with the same results:
The data here is pretty self explanatory, though I'm rather shocked to see Retribution place so low.
Please Note: All data below for casters is based on non-mirror matches only!
Please Note: All data below for casters is based on non-mirror matches only!
Trolls
Madrak1 unsurprisingly made up the bulk of Troll drops in actual games played, and he kept a very high win percentage to boot. This is actually one of the most meaningful conclusions I think we can pull from the data, largely because he had a lot of games played and managed to maintain a high win percentage.
What surprised me wasn't that Kolgrima was behind him in drops, but that she was down into a 41% win rate. This may be because she fills the role of dealing with what would otherwise be problem matchups, or the kinds of lists used with her at the event weren't her best builds, or maybe she's just not as good into matches as players may think.
There weren't a lot of Troll players, but we still have a pretty small amount of casters being played. Borka2 has an incredibly high win rate, though part of that may be because of the small amount of games played with him.
In terms of faction matchup performance, we can see Trolls were put into Cygnar the most and came out with a positive win rate. If you dig a little deeper into the data you can see that while Kolgrima was dropped into Cygnar more than any other Warlock, she only won one of those matches. The sample size is small here, but it may mean she's not as good as a Cygnar drop as we might otherwise have thought. Borka2 and Gunny did well there. Most of the other matchups have too little data to be much use, though we were dropped into Cryx and Skorne only a little less than Cygnar. We surprisingly had a winning record vs. Cryx, with Madrak1 doing almost all the work there. It doesn't seem like Trolls had a particularly bad record, as the only loss rates under 50% are areas where they only played one game and had a loss in that category.
In terms of faction matchup performance, we can see Trolls were put into Cygnar the most and came out with a positive win rate. If you dig a little deeper into the data you can see that while Kolgrima was dropped into Cygnar more than any other Warlock, she only won one of those matches. The sample size is small here, but it may mean she's not as good as a Cygnar drop as we might otherwise have thought. Borka2 and Gunny did well there. Most of the other matchups have too little data to be much use, though we were dropped into Cryx and Skorne only a little less than Cygnar. We surprisingly had a winning record vs. Cryx, with Madrak1 doing almost all the work there. It doesn't seem like Trolls had a particularly bad record, as the only loss rates under 50% are areas where they only played one game and had a loss in that category.
Skorne
Skorne suffered from a slightly losing record overall, but the main takeaway here seems to be that Rasheth is a powerhouse. With 19 games played and a high win rate it just confirms what most players already know: that he's an incredibly solid caster. It could be that his win percentage is inflated by the fact that a Winds of Death list is polarizing - if you don't have a solid anti-gun drop, teams may have angled to get matchups for him specifically.
There were a lot of casters used here, with both Xerxis showing the next highest representation in the faction - though Xerxis2 certainly isn't as powerful as players were hoping. I am surprised to see Xerxis1 doing quite so well, which makes me want to go review what lists were brought along with him to see what players were going for.
In matchup rates Skorne was put into Cygnar the most and came out ahead in the matchup. It appears they did pretty well into Trolls, but absolutely terrible into Grymkin as their next highest matchups played. They also appear to have something of a problem with Circle and Cryx.
In matchup rates Skorne was put into Cygnar the most and came out ahead in the matchup. It appears they did pretty well into Trolls, but absolutely terrible into Grymkin as their next highest matchups played. They also appear to have something of a problem with Circle and Cryx.
Retribution
Retribution really suffered at this event, and I can't put my finger on why. This may be colored by the fact that when I can get out to local events, I play in a meta with Mike Ireland who has piloted Retribution to multiple major convention wins and even represented the US at the WTC last year.
In terms of what let the faction down it does seem we can see what went wrong. Players clearly had high expectations for Kaelyssa, as she made up nearly a third of all Ret drops but she had a poor win rate of only 31%. Elara2 didn't help matters either with the next highest representation but with a terrible win rate of only 18%. Issyria was next in line and had an even worse win rate of 11%.
I've played into these casters and they clearly have a lot more game than is being let on by these numbers. The only guess I have (and it's only a guess) is that in a team event, players had answers to the questions Ret players were asking and were able to angle to avoid or answer them.
In terms of matchups, we see Ret was dropped into Grymkin the most, and had an absolutely horrible time of it, winning only 1 out of 8 matches played. Beyond that, they didn't really have any statistically significant amount of matchups that stand out.
Minions
In less than surprising news, Rask was the most popular Minions caster that was dropped in actual games played, and he came out ahead with a positive win rate. What surprises me is that Barnabas1 came in as the second most played caster in the faction and that he only had a 36% win rate. There just isn't a lot of data here to draw many more meaningful conclusions for the faction, other than the fact that Barnabas1 may not be as strong as players were hoping he'd be.
For matchups we have a similar situation where there isn't anything too statistically significant that we can use to draw many meaningful conclusions. The highest match rate was against Menoth, where Minions suffered, and then into Skorne where they did quite well with a variety of casters used in that match.
Mercs
When I think about Mercs and what I expect to see caster wise I think of Ossrum, Thexus, and Damiano - and that's exactly who was dropped the most in Mercs. Interestingly of those three, only Thexus didn't have a losing record, managing only an even 50% win rate. The faction recovered by having other casters pick up the slack. Magnus2 seems like a caster Merc players may want to experiment with more, though we have a limited amount of data here to say he was a real power house. Similarly, the data seems to show that Gaston2 is going to be as strong as he appears to be, though with only 3 games played it's hard to make a definitive statement.
For matchups we're definitely limited by the data available. The only standouts seem to be that Mercs were dropped into Menoth at a high rate, and manged an even record there. While the total number of games is small, we can see that Mercs didn't win a single game into their Cryx matchup - so that's probably still an issue for the faction even when Ghost Fleet is no longer the predominant Cryx list.
Menoth
Clearly Menoth players at the ATC really liked Amon, dropping him in just over one third of all Menoth matches. He managed to have a slightly losing record, though the faction overall had a strong win percentage. No other caster had close to that representation, but the next three in line were Harby, Reznik2, and High Reclaimer2 - each of whom had a high win rate with Reclaimer2 being the strongest.
For matchups as we saw in the previous section Menoth fought Mercs the most of any other faction in the event, and they had only a 40% win rate there. The second highest match for them was Khador where they broke even. Beyond that we don't really have any statistically significant numbers for matchups, though the faction generally did well except for Cryx, Trolls, and Cygnar where they didn't win any matches, but they had a very small number of games played in each of those matchups so it's not wise to draw many conclusions from this.
Legion
Legion definitely suffered at the event as we saw with the overall win percentage, and the faction is perceived to be relatively weak right now. They're currently going through CID, so hopefully things start looking up. As it is, we can easily see why the faction had a low win rate - their main casters used: Abby2, Fyanna2, and Thags1 all had negative win rates, though Fyanna2 clearly fared the best of the bunch. As it is, it appears that other factions just had answers to what Legion was trying to do.
There's just not a lot of Legion data available to get anything statistically significant here. Typically in MK2 Legion was thought to prey pretty hard on Circle and that seems to continue here with it being their highest matchup and also has a strong win percentage - though with such a small sample size it probably doesn't mean much.
Khador
Khador slightly under-performed at this event, and the reason for it appears to be because players were ready for the two most dropped casters in the faction: Harkevich and Old Witch 2. Hark managed to only have a slightly losing record at 44% but being the most dropped caster, but Old Witch 2 acted as an anchor with only a 25% win rate and being the second most dropped caster. This is surprising since she's generally considered to be quite strong in the faction. It could be that teams were just playing around the faction, or it could be that she's not as strong as players thought. Old notably strong casters in MK3 like Irusk2 and Vlad1 made very strong showings here, though their data set is pretty limited.
In terms of matchups we can see that Khador was used to drop into both Menoth and Cryx the most, getting an even win rate for Menoth and a slightly losing record against Cryx. Overall they seem to have a good spread, though apparently Mercs and Cygnar can be a possible problem matchup for them.
Grymkin
Grymkin dominated the ATC, with a very high representation among all players and the highest win rate of any faction. All of their casters were represented, though King of Nothing was by far the least favorite. The only caster with a negative win rate is Old Witch 3, which lines up with what we saw of her in Khador - though she's clearly stronger in Grymkin than she was playing for the Motherland.
One interesting point is that every caster that could use Arcana instead of having a regular feat did extremely well. It could be that the adaptable nature of Arcana combined with the fact that not many players have a lot of experience playing around it could be the reason for Grymkin's success - or it could just be that they're a little over tuned. They're definitely a faction to watch at further events to see if they can hold up over time as more players get reps into them.
In fact the biggest take away from the ATC data as a whole may be right here with Grymkin - you need to have a plan for them, or at least know what they do and how to play around their Arcana if you want to do well at a big event.
With so many Grymkin players at the event we see that they played into nearly every faction, though what we can glean is that Cryx players avoided Grymkin (conventional wisdom says Grymkin are strong into Cryx, so we probably can conclude it wasn't the other way around). This is significant since Cryx was also well represented at the ATC.
As it is, the main problem the faction seemed to have was with Circle, being one of the highest matchup rates and also having a slightly losing win rate. The other matches where Grymkin did poorly are vs. Menoth and Trolls - but they had so few games against those factions that its hard to draw a definitive statement about those matches.
Cygnar
Clearly Nemo3 and Haley3 made quite the list pairing at the ATC for Cygnar and they were also the most dropped casters. What we can see is that Nemo3 didn't quite live up to the hype as the most dropped caster, but also the caster with the lowest win rate for the faction. It may well be safe to conclude that Nemo3 isn't as powerful as Cygnar thinks he is, or at least that the meta is prepared for the questions he's asking.
Haley3 however managed a solid win rate with a large number of games played, which is impressive and lines up with expectations of her being the new power house in the faction now that Haley2 has been nerfed.
What is surprising is how well Siege2 did, though he has a limited amount of games played he did manage to win all of them. He may well be one to watch in the faction, though I'm not sure he pairs well with Haley3, which may over shadow him. Similarly it's nice to see the updated Kraye doing well.
Clearly teams thought Cygnar and Circle could handle each other and they all turned out to be half right. That was their highest matchup rate and also an exactly even win percentage. As we saw before they also struggled with Grymkin, Skorne, and Trolls - each of whom are known to be able to build decent anti-shooting.
Cryx
A still unnerfed Denny1 did great at the ATC, as should be expected. She was the second most dropped caster, and this may be her last hurrah at a major event before the CID nerfs drop. Skarre1 lead the day as the most dropped Cryx caster with an astonishing 75% win rate. Clearly players need to be looking at how to answer Skarre1 lists going forward as Cryx players are shifting away from Denny1 Ghost Fleet, particularly once the nerfs hit to both the caster and that theme list. Also unsurprisingly Coven had a strong showing in win rate, though only getting half the playtime that Denny1 got. Gaspy1 tied the Coven for 3rd place in representation and had a solid win rate. overall the faction did extremely well.
Since Cryx was well represented, they played against a wide variety of lists, and had no standouts where they were clearly put into one faction more than the others. They went into Circle, Khador, and Trolls the most, managing a positive win rate against the first two, and struggling slightly into Trolls. I must say as a Troll player from MK2 when Cryx absolutely devastated Troll lists of all kinds - this is nice to see. As we can tell from looking at the matchup data, they need an answer to Madrak1.
Convergence
While Convergence doesn't have a lot of casters in their stable, it is a bit sad to see only 3 being used at this event. Axis and Lucant are old staples, though I'm shocked to see no Aurora as she was getting a good amount of talk.
What we can see is that Orion has seemingly replaced Mother as the shooting list almost entirely, though he had a terrible win percentage and the highest drop rate for the faction. Lucant similarly suffered, and only Axis had a staggering win rate, though with only 5 games played.
With so few Convergence players at the event, they just don't have a lot of games and the spread was such that they don't have any match numbers high enough to really draw any good conclusions.
Circle
For a faction that is considered to be weak by the overall meta, Circle had a lot of representation and only a slightly negative win rate. There is some interesting data to be had here - clearly the buffs to Wold's held up as the most dropped caster was Bradigus who has come back to being played. The problem is that at this event, people were ready for him as he only won a third of all his games played - which clearly dragged the faction down. Perhaps we can see that Baldur2 is the Wold focused caster that players should be looking at going forward.
The other big takeaway is that Una2 is back, and that the deserved nerfs from the beginning of MK3 didn't do too much to hurt her as she has the second highest drop rate in Circle and an astonishing 90% win rate. If you're looking to prepare for Circle, it's a safe bet that you should be looking for a way to beat Una2.
As we saw before, Circle was dropped into Cygnar quite a lot and they made an even show of it. The faction did well into Grymkin as their second highest matchup which is notable. The only problems the faction had were against Cryx where they suffered significantly and vs. Legion. Clearly if you're a circle player you need to be sure to have answers for those two factions.
