But I refuse to cede ground on my thesis that gross imbalance between intrinsic team quality is terrible, actually.
If you refuse to cede ground, there's no point arguing against it. It's worth pointing out, though, that the page source for the article you linked shows that it was published in 2017, before the Ogres were improved in that edition with a rework that added a new positional, and before they were tweaked (slightly) again with the new edition, along with the new edition's changes to leveling up, throw team mate, and kick team mate that were largely positive for stunty teams and Ogres in particular.
And you stand by your position that imbalanced game design is good game design. If that belief is a requirement to enjoy BB I wish I knew that from the start.
You're right on the out-of-dateness of the stats, of course. Should perhaps be ignored. Surprisingly few resources with better/newer stats.
The facial expressions on the other guys when I told them I'd bought some ogres was pretty telling, though. As was the comment that I should put them away in favor of a team that could actually play the game.
Tournament play often uses tiers to determine how many extra cash or extra skills certain teams get.
The compressed game time etc. Of tournaments aren't really my cup of tea, so I don't know much about them and would have to search myself to find a good example though.
Saying the team tiers are genius design you should be thankful for sounds a bit dumb. For a new player introduction I would've left it at the info that certain teams are harder to play than others. Like that's how the rule book explains the tiers and tells you which team is in what tier.
Re: stats
The bloodbowlstrategies ones are from the last edition I think. No black orcs or nobility in there for example I think. Ogres did get better this edition. I'm also not sure if the stats for the top and bottom teams aren't skewed anyway because both extremes probably attract a certain type of player, respectively the competitive and the for fun type.
That said playing against goblins, the current tournament bottom team is always great fun or at least exciting with crazy shit happening. For me that counts for a lot. Although I might revisit that opinion next month when I have to play against the gobbo team that just pasted a dwarf team 3:1.
The fact that some teams are playable right out the box and some teams aren't is annoying, yeah. It's a combination of GW giving limited resources to their side games - each team only gets a single dublicated sprue - and a lot of teams having been designed way in the past when GW was still writing rules first, models later.
Dwarves are one of the very few teams that have all their positions inside the box except for the steamroller that almost noone takes. Pretty much every other teams misses at least two positional models.
Underworld actually had a box that was playable. It contained one sprue from the goblin team and one sprue from the Skaven team. I don't know why GW stopped selling that and the old world alliance box.
Goblins are the worst team for your money actually. The box only contains 12 regular gobbos. You need two additional trolls and all the special positionals. But GW would've had to have designed a second sprue for those and as said no team gets two different sprues sadly.
That part is actually my biggest pet peeve about current blood bowl. Although there are a lot of third party companies that have alternative teams. I just don't like the looks of most of those.
That said playing against goblins, the current tournament bottom team is always great fun or at least exciting with crazy shit happening. For me that counts for a lot. Although I might revisit that opinion next month when I have to play against the gobbo team that just pasted a dwarf team 3:1.
This is terrifying
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tzeentchlingDoctor of RocksOaklandRegistered Userregular
I'm gonna go out and say that having some imbalance in the game is in fact good game design, and I believe this is for a couple reasons.
First, people play the game for different reasons. Some people focus purely on winning games. Some people like to build fun or offbeat teams, or see how much mischief they can cause on the field. Some people really like the modeling and converting aspect and build teams because they look cool. Obviously, GW doesn't want to create a team that would never win a game, but the converse (that they should only build teams that are powerful) likewise isn't true either. We see this a lot in Magic, for instance. Some people build the best decks regardless, but some people just wanna play big stompy dudes or get a thrill out of playing their combos even if they don't win all their games. That doesn't mean the game is poorly designed that these niche builds aren't the most competitive.
I'll also point out that there's something like 20-30 teams available, which is a huge variety of choices. Some are going to be easier to play, some harder to play, because there are only so many axes that they can tweak a team along before they start looking like copies of each other. If we say that it's a toss-up in competitiveness between the top 8, and the next 8 are still pretty good in the hands of someone who knows what they're doing, that's a huge variety of choices. They can then either not make any more teams because there's no more differentiable space at the top, or they can make teams that are handicapped in interesting ways but have strengths to balance it out. Ogres, for instance, are a team on the tail end of the distribution - weird, potentially powerful, but with weaknesses that a good player can exploit. Imbalance at the ends of a curve doesn't imply that the game as a whole is poorly made, because it's far more important that there is no "best" team than that there are some "worst" teams.
One can argue that these more challenging teams shouldn't be easily available to new players so that they don't get tricked into buying them and getting frustrated, but I think that's not an issue for a lot of people. It's always nice to have actual models for these teams rather than having to kitbash to play them, and the rules now go clearly out of their way to say "these teams are harder to play and win with" than they even did before.
Lastly, I can potentially agree that in a solely skill-based game, having uneven power levels is bad game design because it creates a significant handicap. If in chess black had knights that move one less square, for instance, no one would play the game. But Blood Bowl has a significant amount of variance in it with the dice rolls that are required for almost every action, and these natural variations can help create interesting games and can even the odds for these more difficult teams. They can also make it even more difficult, of course, but randomness is a part of the game and while in the long run fate evens out, any individual game can be significantly altered enough to be favorable to any team.
As I said, I found the core gameplay fairly enjoyable.
I genuinely dislike extreme imbalance between factions in games, though. In any game where you list/deck build (BB, MtG, X-wing, etc.) players looking for a challenge or to goof around can always build lists/decks with odd or unusual combinations (like my brother's spells-only burn deck in MtG, or my other brother's goblin tribal deck, or my box of Unsanctioned cards).
But if the game is properly balanced between factions, it makes it a lot easier for everyone to have the fun they want. Easier for the noobs to get into the game with fewer pitfalls, easier to adjust challenge to desired level for advanced players.
As an example, goonhammer just released stats for the first rounds of tournaments for the new 40k Kill Team. Best faction Custodes have a 79% win rate; worst faction is tied between Kroot and Dark Eldar at 22% win rate. (Second best faction is at 54%.)
Me, I say bring on the nerfs (and buffs) as appropriate. I'm sure BloodySloth feels that would ruin the perfect design of KT :P
Me, I say bring on the nerfs (and buffs) as appropriate. I'm sure BloodySloth feels that would ruin the perfect design of KT :P
I dunno why you're making this personal, but:
-~80% win rate vs ~20% is a worse spread than anything in Blood Bowl currently, to the best of my knowledge, and
-if the game is clear that the low win rate teams are intended to be a challenge for experienced players, then no, I don't think it's a problem to have teams that are better and teams that are worse in Kill Team, either, necessarily. They need to be designed accordingly, though, and not just be a bad team across the board. I still think that in that hypothetical scenario, that it would do to rein in the difference between the best factions and the worst factions, which is something they have done in Blood Bowl.
Edit: A good example of this would be Old World Alliance in Blood Bowl. They're intended to be a tier 2 (maybe even tier 1? but I think tier 2) team, but as people get comfortable with the new edition, it's becoming apparent that the team is struggling to play at that level. I would support tweaking their team so they perform better overall. Vampires might need some love, too, but they're not "official official" in this edition yet, so we'll see what happens there.
Close game against the Skaven. He had two Merc linemen and a blocker, all with block and -pa. Mercenaries sure got way better than last edition.
Anyway, won 2:1 with 3:1 CAS. Two of those were the new Troll and 1 from a bruiser that badly hurt a skaven blitzer in self defense which was fun. Blorcs didn't get much done this game, even as a cage the didn't get the ball carrier very far into the opposing half. Gobbos had to do some mad rushing to reach the endzone.
I don't know why I continue with them, but random skills don't work that we'll for me.
New skills after this game:
Juggernaut for the troll
Diving catch for a gobbo
Safe pair of hands for a gobbo
And on the brighter side at least sidestep on a gobbo.
Now all the bruisers have a single skill (already had leap, diving tackle, jump up)
I was hoping for some spp on the Blorcs to get at least 1 block, but no luck.
Me, I say bring on the nerfs (and buffs) as appropriate. I'm sure BloodySloth feels that would ruin the perfect design of KT :P
I dunno why you're making this personal, but:
-~80% win rate vs ~20% is a worse spread than anything in Blood Bowl currently, to the best of my knowledge, and
-if the game is clear that the low win rate teams are intended to be a challenge for experienced players, then no, I don't think it's a problem to have teams that are better and teams that are worse in Kill Team, either, necessarily. They need to be designed accordingly, though, and not just be a bad team across the board. I still think that in that hypothetical scenario, that it would do to rein in the difference between the best factions and the worst factions, which is something they have done in Blood Bowl.
Edit: A good example of this would be Old World Alliance in Blood Bowl. They're intended to be a tier 2 (maybe even tier 1? but I think tier 2) team, but as people get comfortable with the new edition, it's becoming apparent that the team is struggling to play at that level. I would support tweaking their team so they perform better overall. Vampires might need some love, too, but they're not "official official" in this edition yet, so we'll see what happens there.
I bear you no ill will. Truly.
I mentioned you by name since you were pretty vocal about unbalanced games being good, actually.
I've played a lot of games (board, CCGs, miniature, computer, etc.) and in every discussion about them, there had been near-uninamious agreement that poor balance = poor design = bad.
Except from BB players.
I'm sure some conclusions could be drawn from this.
Close game against the Skaven. He had two Merc linemen and a blocker, all with block and -pa. Mercenaries sure got way better than last edition.
Anyway, won 2:1 with 3:1 CAS. Two of those were the new Troll and 1 from a bruiser that badly hurt a skaven blitzer in self defense which was fun. Blorcs didn't get much done this game, even as a cage the didn't get the ball carrier very far into the opposing half. Gobbos had to do some mad rushing to reach the endzone.
I don't know why I continue with them, but random skills don't work that we'll for me.
New skills after this game:
Juggernaut for the troll
Diving catch for a gobbo
Safe pair of hands for a gobbo
And on the brighter side at least sidestep on a gobbo.
Now all the bruisers have a single skill (already had leap, diving tackle, jump up)
I was hoping for some spp on the Blorcs to get at least 1 block, but no luck.
I find random rolls can be addicting the same way most gambling is. You invest hard-earned SPP, think a random roll is more likely to get you something good than not, fail, and that just gets you to want to do it again because another random roll is surely a cheaper and faster way to get the player something usable.
Randoms have worked out pretty well for my ogres... if anything they keep getting plain, basically useful abilities like tackle, and not enough of the weird shit that would make them more interesting. Even then, we're in a low dodge league for the most part, so tackle feels like it doesn't really get me where I want to be.
So, what should I be doing with the ogres to maximize my chances of winning minimizing my chances of losing? I asked at my club, and their advice was the unsatisfactory "replace them with a good not shit team".
I should note I've been playing BB7s (max 7 players on the (smaller) field at once). In principle, I can field up to 4 ogres (incl. runt punter) and 3 gnoblar. But with a 600k starting roster and RR costing double the normal, in practice I can field 3 ogres (incl. rp), 0 RR, and 4 gnoblar. (Or 1 ogre, 1 RP, 1 RR, and 5 gnoblar.)
I've tried running a cage, tried running with a gnoblar, tried kicking/throwing the gnoblar with the ball, and tried smashing face.
The cage moved too slowly and was breached through the gnoblar weak points. (It feels like to have forward momentum I would need to be able to blitz multiple times per turn, but that's not allowed so it just moves a few squares forward at most.)
The running gnoblar was intercepted. (This was the closest to success, being stopped just shy of the end zone.)
The thrown/kicked gnoblar face planted and the ball promptly snatched up by opponents.
Ogres were good at smashing face, but could not hold a wide enough front, allowing the opponent to breach the defense and run the ball to the end zone. (Some of this may be due to my bad positioning.)
At all points were I stymied by bone head. (A most unfun rule, I think. Maybe an ogre team should be allowed free RR on this or something.)
Three games, zero touchdowns, and only once anywhere near. (I played againt another ogre team and vampires.)
In fairness, a lot of this was due to my general inexperience, but too often it felt like I was fighting my team instead of fighting with my team.
Sevens might actually be harder for for Ogres than normal rules, as you don't start in contact with the opponent on the line of scrimmage.
Running a cage with slow cage corners is an exercise in patience. You generally don't want to move it fast, but reach the endzone as slowly as possible so your opponent doesn't have enough time for a touchdown themselves. moving several squares forward during a turn is pretty fast for a cage sometimes. Against a high effort defense you often only get one square.
With only so few strong players you could try a half cage along the sideline. Ball carrying Gnoblar on the sideline could work as they have sidestep. Then you’d also only need two Ogres fort he cage with the third free for blitzing or as failsave for when a cage corner fails their bonehead roll. Use the rest oft he gnoblars as a second screen around your cage to make it harder to get caged in on the sideline. The cage only hast o reach the opponent’s line of scrimmage. From there on a gnoblar only needs two rushes to score. They are hard to stop as they dodge anywhere on a 2+ with dodge re-roll.
Try to get 1 or 2 Gnoblars into scoring range so if you're stuck you can run your ballcarrier around or through the defense for a hand-off. Maybe even by just throwing one over the defense into the opponent's backfield.
If you go with the two ogre line up (and to a lesser degree the three ogre one): Foul! With two Ogres and a RR you can max out your roster with 9 Gnoblars. so if one gets send off, there are many more to take its place.
On defense, if you can't breach their cage, try throwing a Gnoblar at it and hope it knocks down the ball carrier or cage corner making an opening for a blitz.
Also remember that Gnoblar base cost on your roster don't count towards Team Value. So if you lay another team that doesn't also have low coat linemen you're looking at like 180k of inducements with the 2 Ogre, 1 RR, 9 Gnoblar lineup.
Your opponents so far, Orgres and Vampires, deal with the same problems you have. Powerful but unreliable expensive players with cheap linemen. Animal savagery on the Vamps might even be worse if they tried to run a cage. A vamp in the corner might knock down his own ballcarrier. If they can score but you can't try to figure out what they might be doing differently in a game.
To tack on to honovere's advice, throw team-mate (and kick team mate) are both fun tools for ogres, but I've had poor luck making touchdowns with those skills, as gnoblars are unlikely to make the trip without breaking their armor. Goblins are really the kings of that move, with their higher armor, faster speed, and a positional designed for it. Throwing/kicking gnoblars is better used by ogres as another "blitz" by aiming them at the enemy, or by dropping them behind enemy lines to just be generally annoying.
Not sure how viable this is in sevens due to the lower player count. Can you still induce Riotous Rookies in sevens?
To tack on to honovere's advice, throw team-mate (and kick team mate) are both fun tools for ogres, but I've had poor luck making touchdowns with those skills, as gnoblars are unlikely to make the trip without breaking their armor. Goblins are really the kings of that move, with their higher armor, faster speed, and a positional designed for it. Throwing/kicking gnoblars is better used by ogres as another "blitz" by aiming them at the enemy, or by dropping them behind enemy lines to just be generally annoying.
Not sure how viable this is in sevens due to the lower player count. Can you still induce Riotous Rookies in sevens?
If you get around a 100k of inducements you can also go the dirtbag way and induce a Stunty Superstar mercenary with the dirty player (+2), sneaky git package.
That option is apparently so effective at its job that the option might get blacklisted in our league's next season.
To tack on to honovere's advice, throw team-mate (and kick team mate) are both fun tools for ogres, but I've had poor luck making touchdowns with those skills, as gnoblars are unlikely to make the trip without breaking their armor. Goblins are really the kings of that move, with their higher armor, faster speed, and a positional designed for it. Throwing/kicking gnoblars is better used by ogres as another "blitz" by aiming them at the enemy, or by dropping them behind enemy lines to just be generally annoying.
Not sure how viable this is in sevens due to the lower player count. Can you still induce Riotous Rookies in sevens?
You cannot.
Riskier, then, but probably still worth using selectively if you find yourself itching to blitz twice during your turn. If you end up taking your gnoblar out along with an opposing player, that's a net gain for you, since gnoblars are worth so little. Plus, it almost certainly won't cause a turnover for you, unless your gnoblar is carrying the ball and doesn't land safely.
To tack on to honovere's advice, throw team-mate (and kick team mate) are both fun tools for ogres, but I've had poor luck making touchdowns with those skills, as gnoblars are unlikely to make the trip without breaking their armor. Goblins are really the kings of that move, with their higher armor, faster speed, and a positional designed for it. Throwing/kicking gnoblars is better used by ogres as another "blitz" by aiming them at the enemy, or by dropping them behind enemy lines to just be generally annoying.
Not sure how viable this is in sevens due to the lower player count. Can you still induce Riotous Rookies in sevens?
You cannot.
Riskier, then, but probably still worth using selectively if you find yourself itching to blitz twice during your turn. If you end up taking your gnoblar out along with an opposing player, that's a net gain for you, since gnoblars are worth so little. Plus, it almost certainly won't cause a turnover for you, unless your gnoblar is carrying the ball and doesn't land safely.
If you get around a 100k of inducements you can also go the dirtbag way and induce a Stunty Superstar mercenary with the dirty player (+2), sneaky git package.
That option is apparently so effective at its job that the option might get blacklisted in our league's next season.
Can you elaborate? Is this with the expansion mercenary rules?
True, you can only blitz once, but a throw or kick teammate into the opponent serves a similar function, just with a bunch more failure points and silliness.
I can blitz or throw once, and also kick. Of course, throwing/kicking is likely to cause a turnover, so…
If you do work your way up to three ogres, you'll be able to blitz, throw, and kick. And it only causes a turnover for you if the gnoblar you throw has the ball and fails to land. If you knock your own dudes over while throwing a teammate, it's still your turn. The exception to this, I believe, is in the unlikely event that your throwing ogre knocks himself over.
If you get around a 100k of inducements you can also go the dirtbag way and induce a Stunty Superstar mercenary with the dirty player (+2), sneaky git package.
That option is apparently so effective at its job that the option might get blacklisted in our league's next season.
Can you elaborate? Is this with the expansion mercenary rules?
Deathzone has the "build your own" Merc rules which are also allowed in Sevens as far as I can tell. There are several archetypes as a base (stunty, lineman, blocker, etc.) which then have to take at least one option from a set of skill ups, stat ups, stat downs or complete skill packages. On of those packages is basically a dedicated fouler who comes with sneaky git and dirty player (+2). Normally you can only get DP (+1) and +2 is a staggering buff over that and a real fouling nightmare for the opponent.
I can blitz or throw once, and also kick. Of course, throwing/kicking is likely to cause a turnover, so…
If you do work your way up to three ogres, you'll be able to blitz, throw, and kick. And it only causes a turnover for you if the gnoblar you throw has the ball and fails to land. If you knock your own dudes over while throwing a teammate, it's still your turn. The exception to this, I believe, is in the unlikely event that your throwing ogre knocks himself over.
Add to that that you can also players that are already knocked down or stunned. So theoretically you could throw a gnoblar into the opposing cage and as long as the gnoblar is still on the pitch afterwards (not K.O. or a casualty) you could run up and kick the same gnoblar again into the enemy.
I thought I could throw or blitz, but it's actually throw or pass. Do I feel like a bone head :redface:
Also, I saw there were mercenary rules in deathzone, but they seemed so vast and complicated that I didn't read them. 7 allows up to 3 mercs from DZ or any number from the base rules.
The Merc rules are currently quite ambiguously written. Especially the Stat up and stat down options. It's admittedly not great. There should be a new FAQ in October/November so hopefully they clear it up a little. Might have to send in a question about that myself.
I finally had time to look up the mercenary rules in death zone. A stunty superstar with dirty player (+2) and sneaky git is 110k.
Three ogres (incl. 1 rp) and 5 gnoblar are 500k.
I seem to recall that gnoblar don't count for team value? Is that true? Can't find the rule. That would easily put me at enough for 110k inducements for all (or at least most) matches even if I bought a bunch more gnoblar.
I just realized that bb7 is really cash strapped compared to regular bb. BB has 1000k for 11-16 players. BB7 has 7-11 players. That should scale to something like 640-690k, but the budget is only 600k.
Sic transit gloria mundi.
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Mr_Rose83 Blue Ridge Protects the HolyRegistered Userregular
Yep, Sevens is basically village league. Where the proper games get crowds of thousand plus millions watching the big games like the Blood Bowl itself live on Cabalvision, for Sevens, it’s a big deal if the mayor shows up.
Anyway the Gnoblar thing is the “low cost linemen” rule on the team roster, which is covered in the rule book on the page before the team rosters start. Or close to that anyhow.
Sevens is purposefully cash strapped I think, so you need to take more cheap linemen with less skills. It's supposed to be the amateurs version of regular blood bowl.
Gnoblar base cost doesn't count, right. It's the low cost linemen rule. It's in the team rules I think, not the skills and traits rules.
You can reduce the cost of the Merc by reducing a stat by 10k. For example PA.
I know 7 is supposed to be the small leagues, but it still smarts since even the low end of "fair" team cost reduction would have allowed me an extra ogre. Hell, with just 7 players I only need another 10k (or 5k if I use 4 blockers and 0 rp) to have 4 ogres + 3 gnoblar.
In any case, if I buy 3 ogres and any number of gnoblar, that counts for 425k. Should have plenty to spend on inducements, then, unless I'm playing against another stunty team.
Rules question: If I throw a team-mate at another player, will that always cause a turnover?
(Throwing a team-mate at an un-occupied square but the thrown player falls over does cause a turn-over if I' reading correctly.)
It's also a turnover if you hit your own player who themselves has the ball. Or if the ogre throws the gnoblar and it somehow hits the throwing ogre. Basically, knocking a player down only causes a turnover if you're knocking down your own ball carrier or the active player (in this case that would mean your ogre who is taking the throw action). If your gnoblar hits anyone else, or hits an empty space and fails to stick the landing, you're golden.
This nuance is the only reason vampires work as a team at all. It also makes Throw Team Mate much less risky than you might think otherwise.
So I think I'll be aiming for 2 ogres + 1 runt punter + 5 or 6 gnoblar (5 gnoblar puts it at an even 500k) for an effective team value of 425k and 100k in the bank.
Assuming my opponent is at ca 600k that would leave me 175k in petty cash alone for inducements every game, 110k for the stunty superstar and e.g. 2 agency cheerleaders or a desperate measure or prayer to nuffle or something for the last 65k. (Or just pimp the stunty a bit more. Sidestep, perhaps.)
If I manage to save up another 40k I can replace the superstar with another ogre. (Or just stick with the merc if that's cooler.)
I don't know how many mercs you can take in sevens, for 60k you can even take a legendary lineman with block and -1pa as options if you need someone who's kinda okay at ball handling, running and blitzing/blocking. As you don't hire the mercs permanently but just for one game with the free inducement money you can play around a bit.
It's 0–3 mercs from death zone or any number from the base rule book. (No mix-and-match.) But both a stunty superstar and a legendary lineman would be in the cards, yes. As you say, I would get new petty cash every match and can try different things.
At some point, one might ask if I'm even playing ogres :P
Build a lineman that's 3 gnoblars in a coat as the Merc
But I understand what you mean. Low cost linemen is a bit of a rules crutch to make Ogre teams more competitive but i Sevens you kinda miss out on the more interesting Ogre specific inducements like the Firebelly and the riotous rookies.
It's basically the winning strategy for halflings at tournaments, right? Be so cheap that you can buy the toughest tree in all of Blood Bowl who's also fantastic at throwing teammates and than grind the opponent to dust with your three S6 players.
Posts
And you stand by your position that imbalanced game design is good game design. If that belief is a requirement to enjoy BB I wish I knew that from the start.
You're right on the out-of-dateness of the stats, of course. Should perhaps be ignored. Surprisingly few resources with better/newer stats.
The facial expressions on the other guys when I told them I'd bought some ogres was pretty telling, though. As was the comment that I should put them away in favor of a team that could actually play the game.
The compressed game time etc. Of tournaments aren't really my cup of tea, so I don't know much about them and would have to search myself to find a good example though.
Saying the team tiers are genius design you should be thankful for sounds a bit dumb. For a new player introduction I would've left it at the info that certain teams are harder to play than others. Like that's how the rule book explains the tiers and tells you which team is in what tier.
Re: stats
The bloodbowlstrategies ones are from the last edition I think. No black orcs or nobility in there for example I think. Ogres did get better this edition. I'm also not sure if the stats for the top and bottom teams aren't skewed anyway because both extremes probably attract a certain type of player, respectively the competitive and the for fun type.
That said playing against goblins, the current tournament bottom team is always great fun or at least exciting with crazy shit happening. For me that counts for a lot. Although I might revisit that opinion next month when I have to play against the gobbo team that just pasted a dwarf team 3:1.
The fact that some teams are playable right out the box and some teams aren't is annoying, yeah. It's a combination of GW giving limited resources to their side games - each team only gets a single dublicated sprue - and a lot of teams having been designed way in the past when GW was still writing rules first, models later.
Dwarves are one of the very few teams that have all their positions inside the box except for the steamroller that almost noone takes. Pretty much every other teams misses at least two positional models.
Underworld actually had a box that was playable. It contained one sprue from the goblin team and one sprue from the Skaven team. I don't know why GW stopped selling that and the old world alliance box.
Goblins are the worst team for your money actually. The box only contains 12 regular gobbos. You need two additional trolls and all the special positionals. But GW would've had to have designed a second sprue for those and as said no team gets two different sprues sadly.
That part is actually my biggest pet peeve about current blood bowl. Although there are a lot of third party companies that have alternative teams. I just don't like the looks of most of those.
This is terrifying
First, people play the game for different reasons. Some people focus purely on winning games. Some people like to build fun or offbeat teams, or see how much mischief they can cause on the field. Some people really like the modeling and converting aspect and build teams because they look cool. Obviously, GW doesn't want to create a team that would never win a game, but the converse (that they should only build teams that are powerful) likewise isn't true either. We see this a lot in Magic, for instance. Some people build the best decks regardless, but some people just wanna play big stompy dudes or get a thrill out of playing their combos even if they don't win all their games. That doesn't mean the game is poorly designed that these niche builds aren't the most competitive.
I'll also point out that there's something like 20-30 teams available, which is a huge variety of choices. Some are going to be easier to play, some harder to play, because there are only so many axes that they can tweak a team along before they start looking like copies of each other. If we say that it's a toss-up in competitiveness between the top 8, and the next 8 are still pretty good in the hands of someone who knows what they're doing, that's a huge variety of choices. They can then either not make any more teams because there's no more differentiable space at the top, or they can make teams that are handicapped in interesting ways but have strengths to balance it out. Ogres, for instance, are a team on the tail end of the distribution - weird, potentially powerful, but with weaknesses that a good player can exploit. Imbalance at the ends of a curve doesn't imply that the game as a whole is poorly made, because it's far more important that there is no "best" team than that there are some "worst" teams.
One can argue that these more challenging teams shouldn't be easily available to new players so that they don't get tricked into buying them and getting frustrated, but I think that's not an issue for a lot of people. It's always nice to have actual models for these teams rather than having to kitbash to play them, and the rules now go clearly out of their way to say "these teams are harder to play and win with" than they even did before.
Lastly, I can potentially agree that in a solely skill-based game, having uneven power levels is bad game design because it creates a significant handicap. If in chess black had knights that move one less square, for instance, no one would play the game. But Blood Bowl has a significant amount of variance in it with the dice rolls that are required for almost every action, and these natural variations can help create interesting games and can even the odds for these more difficult teams. They can also make it even more difficult, of course, but randomness is a part of the game and while in the long run fate evens out, any individual game can be significantly altered enough to be favorable to any team.
I genuinely dislike extreme imbalance between factions in games, though. In any game where you list/deck build (BB, MtG, X-wing, etc.) players looking for a challenge or to goof around can always build lists/decks with odd or unusual combinations (like my brother's spells-only burn deck in MtG, or my other brother's goblin tribal deck, or my box of Unsanctioned cards).
But if the game is properly balanced between factions, it makes it a lot easier for everyone to have the fun they want. Easier for the noobs to get into the game with fewer pitfalls, easier to adjust challenge to desired level for advanced players.
As an example, goonhammer just released stats for the first rounds of tournaments for the new 40k Kill Team. Best faction Custodes have a 79% win rate; worst faction is tied between Kroot and Dark Eldar at 22% win rate. (Second best faction is at 54%.)
Me, I say bring on the nerfs (and buffs) as appropriate. I'm sure BloodySloth feels that would ruin the perfect design of KT :P
I dunno why you're making this personal, but:
-~80% win rate vs ~20% is a worse spread than anything in Blood Bowl currently, to the best of my knowledge, and
-if the game is clear that the low win rate teams are intended to be a challenge for experienced players, then no, I don't think it's a problem to have teams that are better and teams that are worse in Kill Team, either, necessarily. They need to be designed accordingly, though, and not just be a bad team across the board. I still think that in that hypothetical scenario, that it would do to rein in the difference between the best factions and the worst factions, which is something they have done in Blood Bowl.
Edit: A good example of this would be Old World Alliance in Blood Bowl. They're intended to be a tier 2 (maybe even tier 1? but I think tier 2) team, but as people get comfortable with the new edition, it's becoming apparent that the team is struggling to play at that level. I would support tweaking their team so they perform better overall. Vampires might need some love, too, but they're not "official official" in this edition yet, so we'll see what happens there.
Anyway, won 2:1 with 3:1 CAS. Two of those were the new Troll and 1 from a bruiser that badly hurt a skaven blitzer in self defense which was fun. Blorcs didn't get much done this game, even as a cage the didn't get the ball carrier very far into the opposing half. Gobbos had to do some mad rushing to reach the endzone.
I don't know why I continue with them, but random skills don't work that we'll for me.
New skills after this game:
Juggernaut for the troll
Diving catch for a gobbo
Safe pair of hands for a gobbo
And on the brighter side at least sidestep on a gobbo.
Now all the bruisers have a single skill (already had leap, diving tackle, jump up)
I was hoping for some spp on the Blorcs to get at least 1 block, but no luck.
I bear you no ill will. Truly.
I mentioned you by name since you were pretty vocal about unbalanced games being good, actually.
I've played a lot of games (board, CCGs, miniature, computer, etc.) and in every discussion about them, there had been near-uninamious agreement that poor balance = poor design = bad.
Except from BB players.
I'm sure some conclusions could be drawn from this.
I find random rolls can be addicting the same way most gambling is. You invest hard-earned SPP, think a random roll is more likely to get you something good than not, fail, and that just gets you to want to do it again because another random roll is surely a cheaper and faster way to get the player something usable.
Randoms have worked out pretty well for my ogres... if anything they keep getting plain, basically useful abilities like tackle, and not enough of the weird shit that would make them more interesting. Even then, we're in a low dodge league for the most part, so tackle feels like it doesn't really get me where I want to be.
You might be right, gotta reign in the skill up addiction. Or at least wait for enough SPP for a random secondary on the gobbos. Baby steps.
I should note I've been playing BB7s (max 7 players on the (smaller) field at once). In principle, I can field up to 4 ogres (incl. runt punter) and 3 gnoblar. But with a 600k starting roster and RR costing double the normal, in practice I can field 3 ogres (incl. rp), 0 RR, and 4 gnoblar. (Or 1 ogre, 1 RP, 1 RR, and 5 gnoblar.)
I've tried running a cage, tried running with a gnoblar, tried kicking/throwing the gnoblar with the ball, and tried smashing face.
The cage moved too slowly and was breached through the gnoblar weak points. (It feels like to have forward momentum I would need to be able to blitz multiple times per turn, but that's not allowed so it just moves a few squares forward at most.)
The running gnoblar was intercepted. (This was the closest to success, being stopped just shy of the end zone.)
The thrown/kicked gnoblar face planted and the ball promptly snatched up by opponents.
Ogres were good at smashing face, but could not hold a wide enough front, allowing the opponent to breach the defense and run the ball to the end zone. (Some of this may be due to my bad positioning.)
At all points were I stymied by bone head. (A most unfun rule, I think. Maybe an ogre team should be allowed free RR on this or something.)
Three games, zero touchdowns, and only once anywhere near. (I played againt another ogre team and vampires.)
In fairness, a lot of this was due to my general inexperience, but too often it felt like I was fighting my team instead of fighting with my team.
Would have felt a lot better less worse.
Running a cage with slow cage corners is an exercise in patience. You generally don't want to move it fast, but reach the endzone as slowly as possible so your opponent doesn't have enough time for a touchdown themselves. moving several squares forward during a turn is pretty fast for a cage sometimes. Against a high effort defense you often only get one square.
With only so few strong players you could try a half cage along the sideline. Ball carrying Gnoblar on the sideline could work as they have sidestep. Then you’d also only need two Ogres fort he cage with the third free for blitzing or as failsave for when a cage corner fails their bonehead roll. Use the rest oft he gnoblars as a second screen around your cage to make it harder to get caged in on the sideline. The cage only hast o reach the opponent’s line of scrimmage. From there on a gnoblar only needs two rushes to score. They are hard to stop as they dodge anywhere on a 2+ with dodge re-roll.
Try to get 1 or 2 Gnoblars into scoring range so if you're stuck you can run your ballcarrier around or through the defense for a hand-off. Maybe even by just throwing one over the defense into the opponent's backfield.
If you go with the two ogre line up (and to a lesser degree the three ogre one): Foul! With two Ogres and a RR you can max out your roster with 9 Gnoblars. so if one gets send off, there are many more to take its place.
On defense, if you can't breach their cage, try throwing a Gnoblar at it and hope it knocks down the ball carrier or cage corner making an opening for a blitz.
Also remember that Gnoblar base cost on your roster don't count towards Team Value. So if you lay another team that doesn't also have low coat linemen you're looking at like 180k of inducements with the 2 Ogre, 1 RR, 9 Gnoblar lineup.
Your opponents so far, Orgres and Vampires, deal with the same problems you have. Powerful but unreliable expensive players with cheap linemen. Animal savagery on the Vamps might even be worse if they tried to run a cage. A vamp in the corner might knock down his own ballcarrier. If they can score but you can't try to figure out what they might be doing differently in a game.
Not sure how viable this is in sevens due to the lower player count. Can you still induce Riotous Rookies in sevens?
You cannot.
That option is apparently so effective at its job that the option might get blacklisted in our league's next season.
Riskier, then, but probably still worth using selectively if you find yourself itching to blitz twice during your turn. If you end up taking your gnoblar out along with an opposing player, that's a net gain for you, since gnoblars are worth so little. Plus, it almost certainly won't cause a turnover for you, unless your gnoblar is carrying the ball and doesn't land safely.
I thought you could only blitz once per turn?
Can you elaborate? Is this with the expansion mercenary rules?
So your comment is that I should (or at least could) blitz and also kick as an impromptu blitz maneouver? Feels risky.
If you do work your way up to three ogres, you'll be able to blitz, throw, and kick. And it only causes a turnover for you if the gnoblar you throw has the ball and fails to land. If you knock your own dudes over while throwing a teammate, it's still your turn. The exception to this, I believe, is in the unlikely event that your throwing ogre knocks himself over.
Deathzone has the "build your own" Merc rules which are also allowed in Sevens as far as I can tell. There are several archetypes as a base (stunty, lineman, blocker, etc.) which then have to take at least one option from a set of skill ups, stat ups, stat downs or complete skill packages. On of those packages is basically a dedicated fouler who comes with sneaky git and dirty player (+2). Normally you can only get DP (+1) and +2 is a staggering buff over that and a real fouling nightmare for the opponent.
Add to that that you can also players that are already knocked down or stunned. So theoretically you could throw a gnoblar into the opposing cage and as long as the gnoblar is still on the pitch afterwards (not K.O. or a casualty) you could run up and kick the same gnoblar again into the enemy.
Also, I saw there were mercenary rules in deathzone, but they seemed so vast and complicated that I didn't read them. 7 allows up to 3 mercs from DZ or any number from the base rules.
Three ogres (incl. 1 rp) and 5 gnoblar are 500k.
I seem to recall that gnoblar don't count for team value? Is that true? Can't find the rule. That would easily put me at enough for 110k inducements for all (or at least most) matches even if I bought a bunch more gnoblar.
Anyway the Gnoblar thing is the “low cost linemen” rule on the team roster, which is covered in the rule book on the page before the team rosters start. Or close to that anyhow.
Nintendo Network ID: AzraelRose
DropBox invite link - get 500MB extra free.
Gnoblar base cost doesn't count, right. It's the low cost linemen rule. It's in the team rules I think, not the skills and traits rules.
You can reduce the cost of the Merc by reducing a stat by 10k. For example PA.
In any case, if I buy 3 ogres and any number of gnoblar, that counts for 425k. Should have plenty to spend on inducements, then, unless I'm playing against another stunty team.
Rules question: If I throw a team-mate at another player, will that always cause a turnover?
(Throwing a team-mate at an un-occupied square but the thrown player falls over does cause a turn-over if I' reading correctly.)
This nuance is the only reason vampires work as a team at all. It also makes Throw Team Mate much less risky than you might think otherwise.
So I think I'll be aiming for 2 ogres + 1 runt punter + 5 or 6 gnoblar (5 gnoblar puts it at an even 500k) for an effective team value of 425k and 100k in the bank.
Assuming my opponent is at ca 600k that would leave me 175k in petty cash alone for inducements every game, 110k for the stunty superstar and e.g. 2 agency cheerleaders or a desperate measure or prayer to nuffle or something for the last 65k. (Or just pimp the stunty a bit more. Sidestep, perhaps.)
If I manage to save up another 40k I can replace the superstar with another ogre. (Or just stick with the merc if that's cooler.)
At some point, one might ask if I'm even playing ogres :P
But I understand what you mean. Low cost linemen is a bit of a rules crutch to make Ogre teams more competitive but i Sevens you kinda miss out on the more interesting Ogre specific inducements like the Firebelly and the riotous rookies.
I suppose that would be better with snotlings, since you'd also get swarming. It would probably be very bad, but it could also be hilarious.
(In metal too. Have past made-to-order classics also not been finecast?)