Kickoff or Receive First?

[Gobdomino]

Pros and Cons? What do you guys do for the most part? Does your tactic change when playing against certain races? Does your tactic change when playing in a tournament?

[voyagers_uk]

Hi Gobdomino,

this is a very subjective question, and would depend upon many things, such as

1) league or Tournament
2) Am I playing with a Bashy or Agility team
3) Am I playing against a Bashy or Agility team
4) Have I confidence in my defence?
5) Do they have a OTS piece
6) Do they have secret weapons players


amongst others...

I prefer to kick as I am fairly confident in my defensive capabilities, but that is just me.

do you personally have a preference?

[Rolex]

It depends firstly on the team you are playing and you are facing.

With teams like norse or goblins I would always receive. Against those teams I would always receive as well.

11 players agility teams tend to kick in tourneys because it is easier to attack with less players then to defend.
But in league play I tend to attack and stall until I am not risking too many players, then score.
If your opponent has to use 5 players to protect the ball, he beats you up a lot less.

[swilhelm73]

Fundamentally it comes down to how much damage are you and your opponent likely to inflict and how likely is either side to cause a turnover.

With my Chaos Dwarves I generally kick against teams without a lot of kill skills, and receive against teams with a lot of kill skill.

[Dr. Von Richten]

If you're a Bashing/Killing team: Recieve, and try to take as many opponents off the pitch as you can, scoring last turn. 2nd Half, force them to score quickly (then spend your drive same way as the first half) or not at all.

If you're a Speed/Agility team: Kick, either try to steal the ball and score as late as possible, so opponent has no time to equalize, or 2-column defense to stop opponent scoring at all. 2nd half, if you stole the ball in the 1st half, score at any time in your recieving drive, so you're 2-0 ahead and very likely to win. If you didn't steal the 1st half, score as late as possible.

This it the theory, in practice, I rarely manage anything like it (not in the least because I dislike stalling)!

[mzukerman]

I almost exclusively kick off no matter what I play. I used to only play bash and would receive to get the first hits in, but now it doesn't matter. I play a very swarming style of defense, trying to create a lot of havoc on the field. I go for quick turnovers and then get the advantage with receiving in the second half. Even with my current wood elves. If they are are able to withstand the attack, unless I'm playing other elves, I can usually get back and play defense.

[Smeborg]

I always receive, even with an agile counter-attacking team. This worked well with my Slann last season, unbeaten in 17 games. Ditto for my Pro-Elves, 17-2-3 over 24 games. I expect almost always to have 11 players for the second drive (these are not stalling teams). So I might as well give myself a chance of goint 2-0 up in the first half, leaving my opponent to chase the game and take risks.

Some tournament players like to kick with teams like Skaven. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't, but I'm not sure how much of the result can be attributed to the decision to kick or receive.

In a tournament, or when playing against a bash team which is short on numbers, you never know what luck you may have on turn 1 if you receive. For example I well remember a tournament game in which my second block killed a Black Orc on the line. The Orc Thrower was later CAS'd (and sacked) to give me a numbers advantage (with Slann)! That's one reason I like to receive - get those blocks in first and see what happens.

Hope that helps.

[Gobdomino]

I usually always kick first (I play Necromantic) but in the last tournament I received first each time. I have read all of your responses and it seems that everyone chooses this tactic based on the race they are playing against vs. the race they are using. And, of course, in the end, the dice have to be friendly. It would seem to be that against an elfy team, it might be better to receive first to set up destruction and hit first. Conversely, against a slow team, it might be best to kick first, have them set up their position and then slow them to a grind.

[Chris]

If you have a 1 turn option receiving means you can still be in contention turn 16...

[mattgslater]

There must be FUMBBL stats on this….

[Rolex]

If you have a 1 turn option receiving means you can still be in contention turn 16...

It also means you will probably have to try the OTTD with less players.
Trying it on turn 8 might be a lot easyer, especially if you need several players to try it (HE, DE, etc.)

[swilhelm73]

One of the other things that I generally consider.

If you receive you get to start the game with hits and presuming you inflict damage, even on fodder, can generally leverage that into inflicting more damage.

But...

If you receive and score on T8, you are giving your opponent the second half of T8 to hit/foul you, and then a second round of that on T9 AND two chances to get any KOs you inflict back.

So, for example, I have Chaos Dwarf (me) on Khemri match coming up. If I receive I can hit the line skeletons and blitz a more valuable target (though TGs take so many assists!)...but if I do that I have to be careful not to leave anyone in a valuable spot for a return foul (Khemri love to foul) and I will take a gang foul on T8/T9 if I do score in the first half. Also any regen'd players will come back...

Of course if I choose to kick instead, he will be able to hit/gang foul a line dwarf on T1...

choices choices...

[babass]

The Lizards is most probably the team with the one, i choose the most ofen to kickoff.
Because, i prefer to defense with all the 6 saurus and the kroxygor.

[mattgslater]

I usually kick first with high/dark elves, and receive first with Underworld and other ClawPOMB types. Other teams, I receive first out of habit 'cause I don't care and you gotta pick one. And maybe receiving first is better for me 'cause usually when I lose or tie, esp in league games, it's because of stupid damage and the receiving team is generally on the giving end.

[Strider84]

There is only really one reason to kick. This is when you have a oneturner with a fair chance of success (>25%)

Then you can leave him out and be sure he is available in case your defense fails and they can score on turn 8.

The 4 blocks you get when starting can be game deciding. And even if you don't hit anything, you should also be able to estimate when to score with agility teams (optimally stall through or score around turn 5 to put the opponent under pressure to equalize (where you can break him and go up 2:0)

The argument that you can defend with 11 player is weak because if the opponent has to start his offence with only 10 instead of 11, this will be a major advantage in the second half.