Speeding up the game.

[Acerak]

Heck, the first few 2E games we played in a league setting took 10-12 hours.

(NAF-style games, mind you...)

-Chet

[neoliminal]

First I think you have to assume that the game takes too long. If you don't, then there's really no reason to look for ways to speed it up.

Assuming that the game takes too long, what can be done to shorten the games? Someone mentioned that Turnovers can shorten games, and that's true. When I play rookie teams the games breeze by! I've played some in under 2 hours.

If I had a target time, 2 hours would be it. That would leave about 1:30 for moving the actual guys on the pitch. Assuming 32 turns total that's less than 3 minutes per turn.

Play with that for a minute... what can you do in 2 1/2 minutes in Blood Bowl.

Brainstorming (each line a seperate idea):

Make each turn 2 minutes... When the timer goes off it's a turn-over. You can burn a RR for another 2 minutes, just like you can buy off other turnovers.

Increase the difficulty of actions over the course of a turn... Have a mechanism that makes rolls harder as the turn progresses. Thowing the ball is easier as the first action rather than the ninth. This would force rolls to happen earlier in the turn. (I guess the real idea is to find a way to force rolls earlier in a turn, hence producing more early turnovers.)

Work in some way to use coaches to make opposing coaches rolls harder. If I have a tackle coach, then I can force an opponent to re-roll a successful dodge attempt. That uses up the coach for the half. You'd have to figure out how to price the coaches to make this balanced.

Use coaches to give you extra actions. Limit teams to X number of actions per turn, but allow for specific coaching actions to give you an extra action in a turn. Example: I have three blocking coaches. I've used up my 5 actions this turn, but I really need an extra block to keep my ball carrier safe. I use one of my blocking coaches to all for an extra block this turn. Each action type would have a coach with prices varying for each... the Blitzer coach might be 50K, while a Blocking coach would be 10K. (Oi, a fouling Coach for 30K) The regular coach could be used to *any* one action.

John -

[sean newboy]

I played the 3rd season till one year ago. In fact we could have met when u came up bout a year ago but i was packing to move to florida that evening. I agree with u about mark as well, one of the best game store managers i have dealt with.

[CyberHare]

Right off the top let me say that I 100% disagree that games take to long and would fight tooth and nail against any new "official" rules that are implimented to simply speed up the game. I know you're looking for something for you're own league Neo but you just had to throw that "...yet" in there and I remember our conversation from Orion so I can almost hear the BBRC gears turning from here in Montreal.

That said I'll share with you the experience I had running a "Timed tournament" where-in you only had 2 minutes to complete a turn, like the idea you mentioned above. It was a disaster!!! I was told that if I ever tried to run that tournament again I would be booted out as commish. I liked it mind you but every single other coach hated it. It's just not enough time. A lot of moves were left un-done. Frustrated coaches would walk away from the table and not return simply because they were PO'd that there turn was over. To be blunt it's a bad idea.

Aside from that I havn't tried any of the other idea's but they sound bad. But as I said, I wouldn't want to artificially shorten the game.

-Brian

[neoliminal]

Right off the top let me say that I 100% disagree that games take to long and would fight tooth and nail against any new "official" rules that are implimented to simply speed up the game. I know you're looking for something for you're own league Neo but you just had to throw that "...yet" in there and I remember our conversation from Orion so I can almost hear the BBRC gears turning from here in Montreal.

No BBRC-ness applied at all. It's a pet peeve. Others might enjoy the length of the game. I'll start a poll to see what the "optimum" time for blood bowl might be...

That said I'll share with you the experience I had running a "Timed tournament" where-in you only had 2 minutes to complete a turn, like the idea you mentioned above. It was a disaster!!! I was told that if I ever tried to run that tournament again I would be booted out as commish. I liked it mind you but every single other coach hated it. It's just not enough time. A lot of moves were left un-done. Frustrated coaches would walk away from the table and not return simply because they were PO'd that there turn was over. To be blunt it's a bad idea.

You did have a bad experience. My suggestion isn't quite the same, as you can add time with a RR. But then again, you don't seem to want to speed the game up at all.

Aside from that I havn't tried any of the other idea's but they sound bad. But as I said, I wouldn't want to artificially shorten the game.

I appreciate your candor, but I epxected nothing less from anyone who likes the amount of time the game takes.

John -

[Lucien Swift]

game length has been the bane of my local leagues for years... i've always thought that getting the game done in an hour or less would greatly improve the longevity of the league and the interest of the casual players... to that end i've tried a host of solutions to speed things up... among them:

2 td's wins... a holdover from 2e, we played to 2 td's for a while... kind of artificial, but it did tend to finish in under 2 hours... moderately disliked.

7 and 9 players... we also ran a season where we had 7 players on the field for each team... it was a slightly quicker game, but overall, not as satisfying.. trying it with 9 might as well have been 11 time-wise without the good things about 11...

2-minute turns... this was something we really tried to get people into, but usually, they would just agree to go ahead and take the three hours and avoid the nuisance (without a chess clock or egg timer, it's a hassle to watch a second-hand)

simplified players... we played a few games where only a handful of players could develop skills, similar to the way 2e campaigns worked were most players would just become "veteran" and only a handful of star players could develop.... the point being that without having to constantly double-check waht skills players had, the game would go quicker... in the end, we missed the player development and found the teams unbalanced when they couldn't develop (dwarves were too powerful with all those skills)...

none of those produced a wholly satisfactory game in a shorter time...

an idea i never had an opportunity to test was that each team could only activate 2 players during a turn who were more than 5 squares from the ball... i thought this would lead to some interesting gameplay effects while speeding up the game slightly... not well-recieved by my league players at the time, it just got shelved...

ultimately, i am firmly in the camp that feels that games are just too long... i'm not in college anymore, i don't have unlimited time on my hands.... these days i'm lucky if i can arrange a game a month on a weeknight, which means i have 2 to three hours total time per month to play bloodbowl, if that... a single game could mean staying up well toward midnight and both annoying my wife and being a zombie when i get up a handful of hours later to go to work.... just not practical... i want a game that finishes up in an hour or so, leaving a handsome amount of time for socializing, boasting, and eating bad foods.... this being an adult nonsense has totally ruined bloodbowl for me...

but, it is clear that there is no way to take the existing game mechanics and force them into an hour-long game, the basic actions of the game, given enough turns to make it a good simulation, take roughly 2 to 3 hours to complete...

so, the only option left is to reform and recreate the game's core mechanics... not an option...

thus, people without time for bloodbowl really can only turn to the pbem game, as wholly unfulfilling and aesthetically bland as it is, if we want to play at all..

hi hum...

[sean newboy]

It should be noted that the time to complete a game is really up to circumstances. With 2 experienced coaches and good teams it can take as little as 1.5 hours. That said, if u want to encourage new players, Never Never Never have 2 rookie coaches go against each other Chaos Dwarves vs Dwarves!!! Its a wonder i even chose to play the second game lol. Score ended up being 1-0 in ot.

[christer]

Personally, I don't like time limited turns.. When I play a game, I want to be able to talk with my opponent... Having a time limit foces me to concentrate on the game, and any attempts by the opponent to talk during my turn will only irritate and distract me... Sort of spoils some of the fun for me...

-- Christer

[DaFrenchCoach]

Personally, I don't like time limited turns.. When I play a game, I want to be able to talk with my opponent... Having a time limit foces me to concentrate on the game, and any attempts by the opponent to talk during my turn will only irritate and distract me... Sort of spoils some of the fun for me...

-- Christer

Totally agree with you... Blood Bowl is just a game after all, and also a way for metting people... Erm, I voted for 2 hours, for reasons mentioned before in your poll: possibility to make 2 games in a saturday afternoon... And a time limit is a good solution for it... Sometimes, when I played with friends I know well, it never took more than 2 hours.

Neo, just my humble opinion: if you allow a limited actions per turn, wouldn't you increase the possibility of having a tie, so an extra-time ? (not sure I'm clear...)...

[neoliminal]

Neo, just my humble opinion: if you allow a limited actions per turn, wouldn't you increase the possibility of having a tie, so an extra-time ? (not sure I'm clear...)...

I don't think so. You would just reprioritize your actions. Ball handling would happen earlier. With both sides dealing with less actions, you would have less defense as well as less offense, meaning scores would probably stay the same.

I think it's interesting that (at the time I posted this) 48% of those responding thought the game should take 2 hours or less.

John -

[neoliminal]

Another way to force turnovers earlier would be to dictate the order of actions. Order the actions from most likely to fail, to least likely to fail.

Example of Order of Actions:

Foul
Pass (or Throw Team-mate)
Hand-off
Blitz
Block
Move

John -

[sean newboy]

I would vigourously oppose handoffs taking precedence over passing. Most of the time u want to do both, its the handoff u need first.

[DaFrenchCoach]

Another way to force turnovers earlier would be to dictate the order of actions. Order the actions from most likely to fail, to least likely to fail.

Example of Order of Actions:

Foul
Pass (or Throw Team-mate)
Hand-off
Blitz
Block
Move

John -

I'm not sure you will save a lot of time with it... But your remark is good: if you can find something which may allow a complete game in 2 hours, it should be OK for me !

Erm, a last note: giving an order of actions could standardize the game... And break the balance between teams. For example, with your order of actions, assuming you won't foul too much due to IGMEOY, AG 4 teams would be favoured, wouldn't they ? Of course, powerful teams would be favoured after, but it would break the balnce of game... to my humble point of view (I know this is the second time I talk about my "humble point of view what I tried to say is I don't want to throw back your ideas without using it. PLaying should give the only answer to all my objections).

I like your ideas, and I think I understand your goals, but I'm not sure looking after the game mechanics is a good idea. I liked the idea of Lucien, if I remind it well, who will allow 40 minutes per half-time... Even if I'd like to know how it would work if you spent all your time when turn 6 arrives... using a reroll would give you 5 extra minutes ?

[neoliminal]

I would vigourously oppose handoffs taking precedence over passing. Most of the time u want to do both, its the handoff u need first.

Yeah. I can see your point. To be honest, I didn't really think the order through very much. The only thing I thougth was good was that moving alone be left until the end. It's normally the fastest part if you are just moving into position and not looking to increase your assists.

Even if I'd like to know how it would work if you spent all your time when turn 6 arrives... using a reroll would give you 5 extra minutes ?

Then what happens if you have no RR's left? Kinda hard to do anything, really. I think the 40minutes per half could work, but everyone would need chess clocks.

John -

[Lucien Swift]

forced order of actions would ruin the game... as much time would be spent checking a chart to remember what to do next as would be spent playing, and most of the organic flow of the game would be ripped out...

we're not playing an avalon hill game here...

consult chart 7.43.2 and find another way to speed things up....