Orcs on the back-foot

[J_Bone]

Hi guys... This is my first post so please be gentle. I've just started playing Blood Bowl again after many years (the last edition I played was the 2nd) after a bunch of my friends raided the attics of our parents' houses and discovered our old stashes of BB miniatures etc.

So we've kicked off the league and I am only two games in but already suffering and wondered what advice you guys might have?

I set up an orc team with the following roster:

4 x black orc blockers
4 x blitzers
2 x linemen
1 x thrower
3 x re-rolls

I've always done well with this line-up on the Cyanide game but am getting battered in our little league.

My first game was against a bunch of Wood Elves. I thought that this would be a nice easy game as even if I got outrun I could still bash them into a pulp and do better against them later in the game / league. The other player is very experienced and quickly outran me so I focused on bashing him in the hope that I could pull it back in the second half. Unfortunately, regardless of me setting up endless two-die blocks I rolled only a single stun in the entire game and one of my linemen was killed. It ended 3-0. My thrower got MVP and rolled a 12 on his improvement roll so I gave him strength to try to make him more survivable and harder to attack in the cage.

Next game was against orcs. I received the kick-off with my thrower, caged him and went up one wing. Within two turns of getting swamped and rolling nothing but pushes he was dead. I carried on but wound up receiving 4 casualties and a KO that never recovered, barely holding on. It ended as a 2-0 loss.

I can't really see where I went wrong with my games (as I am always trying to weigh up the risks and protect myself whilst exploiting my opponent's mistakes) and the other guys are sure it's just horrendously bad luck but I'm convinced that I must be able to do more as these results are just horrendous!

My questions are these... Where does my team go from here? I now have no thrower and 2 journeymen linemen in a team with no development. What strategies should I employ? I have 60k in the bank so I can buy a rookie thrower after my next game but God only knows what state I'll be in by then. I don't normally go online looking for strategy as I like to formulate my own in games but I think I need the help right now!

I have tried using the search function to view orc tactics & strategy but it's not turning anything up. Any links to useful threads would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

[Pedda]

I'm not an orc coach, but I've got similar experience with my undead.
I recently had a game against pro elf where I didn't manage to do more than stun his players, but he managed to KO or injure my players.
That happens and it's a part of blood bowl. Sometimes the dice aren't with you.

Regarding the thrower, until you've got the money to replace him, I'd try to score with a blitzer, twice, then change blitzer.
You're blitzers are the vitial part of your team and you should try to score with them asap. Fill the rest of the with journeymen and use inducements to you advatage.
A merc thrower isn't too bad since he comes with reroll skills and for 150k you get a merc thrower with leader, ie another reroll on top.

Have a look over att plasmoid.dk for some insparation.

[J_Bone]

Thanks for the advice! I do definitely need to make more use of my blitzers as ball carriers.

One thing that has struck me after reading those articles is that I may overcommit on offense and telegraph my plan too soon. i.e. Caging up on one flank immediately upon retrieving the ball rather than caging up in the centre and then breaking out to one side upon spotting a weakness (this would also stop me getting crowd-surfed and make the opponent commit more of his team).

Also, I may need to utilise my team as more of a unit rather than allowing my opponent to focus on pockets of my guys here and there. I was wondering if holding the ball back in my own half and holding the line would be better than caging in the first few turns? This way there would be no particular part of the line for my opponent to focus on and I could perhaps react to the results of the first few rounds of blocks before I commit the ball carrier?

[Smeborg]

Hi J_Bone, and thanks for a brave first post.

Wood Elves (and AG4 teams in general) have the advantage over rookie Orcs, the result you had is not unusual. In bash vs. bash matches, it can go pear-shaped quickly for one or other of the teams (I killed 4 rookie Orcs in a match once thanks to wild dice). You drop one hint: that you caged near a sideline. In general, a cage in the centre of the pitch is more mobile (a cage near the sideline is easier to bring to a halt). But of course there are times that you have no choice but to cage near the sideline.

I enjoy playing teams which have been mashed a bit at the beginning and are struggling for numbers, I remember well one Chaos Dwarf team which fell to TV84. It was very satisfying to get it back to a full roster.

You have the option to develop a Blitzer as a Runner (starting with Sure Hands, Kick-off Return). He actually makes a better Runner than the Thrower (but a worse Thrower, of course). I have seen this done successfully, playing with no Throwers gives a leaner TV and a team on which all players are AV9. Whether you want to play this way is largely a matter of taste.

In general, a slow caging team like Orcs can expect to advance the caged ball only at a slow pace (say 1 or 2 squares per turn on average). Sometimes the cage will not advance (or will even go backwards). Bearing this in mind, don't be shy to develop an early secondary scoring threat in the form of a downfield Receiver (typically a Blitzer). Your opponent has to take care of this threat. If he chooses to attack (blitz) the Receiver, it will often have the benefit of allowing the cage to advance more quickly. In any case, you can use the "average" speed of the cage to help determine what else you need to do in order to score.

Hope that helps.

[Smeborg]

I was wondering if holding the ball back in my own half and holding the line would be better than caging in the first few turns? This way there would be no particular part of the line for my opponent to focus on and I could perhaps react to the results of the first few rounds of blocks before I commit the ball carrier?

You do not need to cage if the ball is just as well protected by a simple screen (line). This may occur typically on turn 1 of offense. In general, once the ball is caged, you should rarely refuse an opportunity to advance (because the average rate of advance is so slow).

With all teams, but especially the slow ones, I try not to concede any space fo my opponent (so, for example, I will always try to press my opponent back by holding a line as far advanced as I can). Sometimes a double line (2 lines of 5 players) can be achieved on turn 1 of offense, meaning there is no need for a cage (against a bash team, that is). Sometimes the line only needs to be doubled for about 3 players (i.e. a 5-player first line and a 3-player second line, which would leave 2 players free to make a "sortie" into the opponent's half as early as turn 1).

It is possible that you are over-committing to the LoS on offense (I used to do this a lot). You can play around with offensive deployments on your own, to see what gets the best command of space by the end of the first turn (or two).

All the best.

[J_Bone]

Thanks very much for the insight, Smeborg... I think you have hit upon a few issues that are very much my tactical errors. I have been sitting pretty heavily on the line of scrimmage and over-committing. Even when I do not get bashed to death my offensive drives seem to get stopped pretty quickly and then I'm just bogged down to the point where I can't see how to bust through the defense. This is especially true if the ball is popped loose and I am either trying to bash back or pick up the ball on sixes etc.

This was the issue when I committed to one sideline too early with my cage (as mentioned earlier). The ball was popped loose and even though the opposing coach couldn't get to it, I wasn't able to formulate a way to retrieve it myself. I kept bashing back, hoping to clear the area and eventually just lost the fight and he got a blitzer to it. I'm sure there must have been a better way to get a man to it. It seemed unlikely to be able to dodge and then pick up but perhaps I should have forgone my final block action and attempted it instead as even if I failed it would have scattered all over an area heavily populated by me and given me possibly multiple chances to pick it up?

I can see myself enjoying being the underdog and making some kind of comeback with this team but at the moment it is just a bit embarrassing! I have certainly been on the wrong end of some rough luck but I do need to work on the basics so I will be able to formulate a plan and react appropriately when things do inevitably go wrong.

[mattgslater]

For me, it's about using 8-9 players or so to cover everything from the initial play-side sideline to the far wide zone, leaving me room to change direction if the opponent bites too hard on the sideline attack. I like to keep the ball initially on the play-side wide-zone marker on the first couple turns, close enough to the strong side to be safe and close enough to centerfield to redirect if needed.

Re: replacing players, replace all lost Blitzers, but otherwise wait until you're flush with cash or take MVP Journeymen.

Re: skilling up, Blitzers are everything. You need 2x Mighty Blow and Tackle, and probably a statfreak and a cog. Blockers are great at higher levels, early on I like staying at 3 if one dies and then getting the 4th one later.

Re: luck, brush it off.

Re: stuff it's too late for but now but you can think about for later. I like this build for Orcs:
3 Blockers
4 Blitzers
4 Line-Orcs
4 Re-Rolls
Purchase Priorities: 1) Apothecary, 2) replace Blitzers, 3) 70k Treasury cushion, 4) replace Blockers and add a Blocker, 5) replace Line-Orcs with Line-Orcs or Thrower.

[J_Bone]

Ah, so you don't really rate the thrower that much then? That's interesting... I was thinking of the thrower as essential just because of the 'Sure Hands' meaning that I could more reliably retrieve the ball but I can totally see your logic. I should be making more use of my blitzers. Mighty blow and tackle sounds like a good combo but I don't quite understand what a "cog" is? I tried looking up the term but didn't come up with anything? Is this a common BB term that I'm just not aware of?

As I was painting up the extra journeyman lineman last night I was having a think about the way I position my line and realised that I am also not making best use of my black orc blockers (and as a result, limiting my ability to use my blitzers). I have tended to have all of my black orcs on or just behind the line of scrimmage and blitzers on the outsides. I intended this to work so that my blitzers could burst through the lines at the sides while the blockers control the centre but what actually happens is my ST4 blockers get stuck in the centre and my opponent doubles up on the ST3 pieces on the wings and I have no breakthrough pieces. Perhaps I should work with two blockers in the centre and one on each wing to stop this and allow me more chance to do something with my blitzers on the wings? This would also work towards stopping them from chipping the line down from either end as tends to happen sometimes?

[mattgslater]

"Max out on Blitzers" is the only commandment. Everything else is optional or format driven. There's no one way to play Orcs, or to build them. I run four Ranked Orc teams on FUMBBL, and they're all quite different from one another.

http://www.fumbbl.com/p/team?team_id=647242
http://www.fumbbl.com/p/team?team_id=712375
http://www.fumbbl.com/p/team?team_id=748720
http://www.fumbbl.com/p/team?team_id=753434

* If you're playing for the long haul in a scheduled environment, you probably want a couple BOBs as vehicles for Guard. You can't maintain a BOB squad at high TV so easily anymore, the combination of the new Claw and the new Apoth makes them dicey. At low TV, they're basically super-Zombies, and any more BOBs than you need aren't worth the cost. In TV-driven formats (Cyanide FOL/MM, FUMBBL R/B, etc) they're dead weight.

* Throwers as Sure Hands vessels are fine, but the main killer against elves is bad positioning, not Strip Ball. I'd much rather take the ball from a Sure-Handed guy in a backfield X-cage than try to steal it from "whoever needs the points" in a stout fortress at the line, with only one possible direction of attack. Let them jump into the cage, half-die strip, and make you pick up again. But then you've got a TacklePOMB Blitzer sitting there to clean his clock, and then you just pick it up and move on. I like them at higher values when I can try crazy stuff, and at rookie level they're okay.

* For me, a Troll is like BOB #5. They're suboptimal as players, but tack on a couple ST buffs on the team and an Orc squad with max BOBs and even a rookie Troll gets really powerful, especially in round robin formats. I like Linemen, but if you like Goblins go ahead and do that instead.

* Goblins are fun alternatives to the simple but effective Linemen. Many coaches like running one for the Stunty. Linemen are every bit as optional as Goblins, but they're more reliable. I like giving my Linemen Block and Frenzy, so I can play silly games with my opponent without exposing good players.

Here's one: 4 Blitzers, 4 BOBs, 3 Goblins, 4 RR. Play one match, fire any Goblins without SPP, run Journeymen. This is explicitly illegal in FUMBBL Ranked, where I play, but I've done it on Tabletop.

[Overhamsteren]

Against wood elfs it's probably a good idea to cage and spread players around the cage to make a leaping sack attempt and pick up require some additional dodges. Also carrying with a blitzer is better against dancers with no strip ball.

But yeah against a more controllable opponent a screen is better as it will give you more options of pushing forward, and of course you can change formation into something tighter during the drive if it looks like a good idea at some point.

If you are completely stopped you might consider running some blitzer/linemen(goblin?) recievers down field turn 6-7, it's a not a great option but it's a lot better to have some AG3 attempt in turn 8 than to have no chance.

As for luck, if you play orcs and get a lot of good blocks, can't hurt the opponent and he hurts you, well it's just bad luck and very tough to play around with the slowish orcs. You will probably have to revert to some kind of agility play which will of course often just be the final nail in your coffin.

[Smeborg]

J_Bone, the Orc Thrower is useful, his main quality is the ability to pass when the Orcs are in a tight spot, this can be really annoying for the opponent. Orcs are the only bash team with a proper Thrower (and one of very few teams to start with Sure Hands). There are plenty of different options for Thower development, you can emphasise Runner skills (Block, K-Ret, Fend), Thrower skills (Accurate, S-Throw), or utility skills for use on both ofense and defense (Block, Tackle). Or you can combine different elements according to your preferred style for the team. A Thrower who gets a stat increase (e.g. +MA or +AG) can be outstanding. Quite a lot will depend on your choice of final roster, and how you like to set up on defense.

Another thought to maybe put you on the front foot: do not allow your opponent to block your players unnecessarily. Pick and choose when to end your turn in tackle zones. If you think in terms of control of space (rather than simply in terms of blocking), this will help determiine how many players end your turn in contact (anything from most to none). Particularly important on your first turn of offense. When I started playing bash teams, it took me quite a long time to get used to the idea that having no-one to block could be a good thing for my team (at the right time, of course).

Hope that helps.

[J_Bone]

Thanks so much for all of this guys... It's very helpful and is giving me loads to think about.

Tonight, I went out to the house of the guy who runs the orc team that I lost against on Monday and played a friendly (non-league) game with him running a 1,000,000 TV starting line-up and me running my busted up team with the journeymen. I utilised a lot of what we have been discussing here and I did so much better than I previously did with the better line-up. The difference was unbelievable. Unfortunately, all I managed was a 0-0 draw in the end due to overextending with my blitzers... I need to learn to be more patient but I am definitely improving.

On my offensive drive I utilised a cage in the centre of the pitch and a very strong screen on the line of scrimmage which allowed my blitzer ball carrier to react to where the weaknesses in either my or the opponent's line were, move the cage around behind the line, and made it VERY difficult for my opponent to get anywhere near him. I saw an opportunity in turn 6 to run the blitzer out on one wing to within 6 spaces of his end zone (on his own). I took the risk and my opponent managed to base the blitzer in his next turn. All I needed to do was dodge out on a roll of three or more with a re-roll. Naturally, I rolled a 1 and then a 2 on the re-roll. Lesson learned! I will be far more careful to advance my cage / screen further forward before making any kind of break-out play with my blitzers.

I did not find myself missing my thrower at all in this game and the journeymen lineorcs definitely did not feel like a weakness. It was quite nice to have quite expendable pieces which I could use to jam up the opposition. I'm wondering now whether to bother replacing the thrower at all and whether it is worth replacing the journeymen with normal lineorcs at all. I feel that it would be nice to add a troll as "BOB #5" like Matt mentioned but for now I think I will settle for an apothecary and wait to see how my team (and my play style)develops before committing to something like this.

[J_Bone]

Thanks again for all of your help guys... Since receiving your advice I have played two league games and won both! The first was against skaven where I ran a really effective bashing game and won 2-0, scoring once in each half. The second was last night against humans. I caged up in the first half, got slowed down, did a lot of bashing, made a breakout play which was stopped and then in the second half stole the ball, caged up, got a lineman, blitzer and blocker down the field on the opposite site and made a pass play in the very final turn to make it a very exciting 1-0 win!

I rolled terribly for my winnings in both matches but now have an apothecary, a new thrower with a skill (Leader... I had trouble deciding between Leader, Nerves Of Steel and Accurate but figured Leader is a quite useful universal skill) and two blitzers with Mighty Blow. I'm quite pleased with how I've managed to turn it around!

[stashman]

Very skilled start-up:

4 Blockers (ST4)
4 Blitzers (Block)
1 Thrower (Sure Hands)
2 Goblins (Dodge)
3 Re-Rolls
1 FF
1 AC
1 CL

alt.

4 Blockers (ST4)
4 Blitzers (Block)
3 Goblins (Dodge)
4 Re-Rolls

If you think gobbos are to weak after first game, just sack them and ge 3 journeymen

[J_Bone]

Thanks for the input but the original post was regarding having already started a team and having to recover after early losses, not the best starting line-up to choose.

It is interesting though... I've not really seen a lot of goblins in people's starting line-ups. I have only ever put one in if I have a troll to give me some extra options.

I don't think the others in the league would react well to the goblin dumping tactic (although I personally think it does even out as though you are saving money you are taking Loner lineorcs...). I think there would be an overwhelming chorus of "Cheeseball" as soon as I announced it.