how to put dwarves onto the pitch

Ancalagon · Post by **Ancalagon** » Fri Mar 22, 2002 4:36 pm

thx chet I'vent seen your post becauz we wrote nearly same time. I understand what you mean, but I think that having only three LB on scrim makes them easily pinballed.

Norse: Were I usually play people ask always before blocking which skills has the man who are going to block... but I'll remember to use it, maybe someone forgets to ask... ;-P

Trambi · Post by **Trambi** » Fri Mar 22, 2002 4:49 pm

Norse normally coach knows the skill players :?

Acerak · Post by **Acerak** » Fri Mar 22, 2002 8:41 pm

While placing only 3 on the line might get them outnumbered for that first round, by bunching them (..XXX..) you'll actually minimize the extra hits.

I know this is very popular:

.X.X.X.

...but for the life of me I'm not sure why it's SO popular.

Geoff Porritt tried this at Resurrection:

X..X..X

Of course, that allowed me to set up my wings to add assists against the outside LoS players, so I'm not sure what the rationale was...unless it involved "spreading the field so the Runners can take advantage."

-Chet

P.S. A Pitch Invasion stunned the front three players anyway

Longshot · Post by **Longshot** » Mon Mar 25, 2002 4:56 am

against skaven/elf team, i would have more LB deep in my defense.
Deeper it is, Better it is!!

Norse · Post by **Norse** » Mon Mar 25, 2002 8:15 am

Against fast teams it is essential to keep your defence deep, but I still say load up the LOS, and the reason is this.. I play wood elves too, so if you set up like:

--XXX--

then I will put my woodies like

XX----X

giving me 2 free guys and 1 dodge on a 2+!!

If you load up your LOS, you force the opponent to either block you (a risk v Dwarves) or dodge away (a risk v Dwarves)..

I still say load up the LOS, let the rest of the pitch take care of itself!!

As most Dwarf SPPs come from casualties, why set up any other way??

Ancalagon · Post by **Ancalagon** » Mon Mar 25, 2002 8:59 am

Hi there!!
Finally I played 2 matches this weekend with my dwarfs and lost both. I'm not worried because are preseason matches...
First match was against orcs and lost 1-0 on third time. Was a hard match played friday late at night (2 a.m.). Following norse advice I blocked as many times as I could ag3 players but I didn't pass armour rolls and only did 2 uncounscious. Although there was not much blood, each turn near all minis from one of the two teams were on the floor... I failed a wonderful move at the end of turn 8 of second half ; one blitzer get up into a BO zone, dodged, grabbed the ball inside this BO zone, dodged again, extra square and in the last extra square... rolled 1

. One of my trollslayers got hurt on 3rd time, niggling injury (following Trambi advice I blocked an ogre, did nothing, and then he blocked me) and I lost 1 FF.
Next match was against DE. I had 10 players and my friend had 9 and I lost 2-1 on third time again because he suceeded throwing a long bomb with his lineman. Again I did no casualties, just 3 uncons. I tried some ways of playing from "elf web" type, wich worked really well, to "dwarf box". This last one didn't work, he opened the cage when one of my LB had the ball and I was 6 squares from TD... he had a witch that had block so he asisted and blocked one of my runners at the corner of the box, pushed inside and the carrier of the ball was pushed too; I couldn't rebuild the cage but blocked a lot trying to avoid danger. But again the witch dodged and rolled 1 dice against my ball carrier. then the lineman grabbed the ball and throw the long bomb.

Norse · Post by **Norse** » Mon Mar 25, 2002 9:48 am

Bad luck mate!

I think at least you won the blocking battle though, yes?

Sometimes you need to roll good AV rolls at the right time, but I hope that blocking and following up provided you with a fun game..

In a league, your grinding tactics would gradually wear down other teams.. Dwarves never do well in one-off games, but their play is suited to a long campaign.. My stunties progress so far in A'dam has been
1) Lose 1-0
2) Lose 5-0
3) Draw 1-1
4) Win 2-1
5) Win 2-0
6) Draw 2-2
7) Lose 2-1

Win 1-0
9) Win 1-0

hopefully you can see a pattern emerging...

Keep slogging, it's well worth it

Ancalagon · Post by **Ancalagon** » Mon Mar 25, 2002 10:08 am

Well, let's see what happens next match. Luckily I had enough money to buy another Longbeard, so in case that my slayer couldn't play due his niggling injury I'll still have 11 players next match.
I forgot to say that I made 4 passes, and now I have 3 players with 5 spp (one runner, one blitzer and one LB).
But still have to play with lizards two matches, and then decide wich team will go on league. I'm nearly decided by dwarfs because they have some starplayers, but lets see what happen next match.

Norse · Post by **Norse** » Mon Mar 25, 2002 10:44 am

Starplayers! PAH!

make your own Star players.. I now have 4 LBs with mighty blow, 4 with guard, 2 with stand firm and one with S4...

I don't need no stinking star players!

Marcus · Post by **Marcus** » Mon Mar 25, 2002 11:36 am

Geoff Porritt tried this at Resurrection:

X..X..X

Of course, that allowed me to set up my wings to add assists against the outside LoS players, so I'm not sure what the rationale was...unless it involved "spreading the field so the Runners can take advantage."

I use this setup quite often with my own skavs for exactly that reason. I'm never one to play for damage minimisation at the expense of field position. Bunching players together on the LOS gives the opponent a much better opportunity to hit the outside linebacker &/or set up a nice advance pocket on the hashmarks.

Spreading the front line players out forces the opponent to play at least 2-4 player off the main thrust of the play and sets the tone of the drive from the kickoff from a "tight" play to an "open" one, which will almost always benefit skaven.

YMMV of course, but for my style of play it works a treat.

Marcus

Acerak · Post by **Acerak** » Mon Mar 25, 2002 2:52 pm

Spreading the front line players out forces the opponent to play at least 2-4 player off the main thrust of the play and sets the tone of the drive from the kickoff from a "tight" play to an "open" one, which will almost always benefit skaven.

I couldn't tell if it worked, of course, because a Pitch Invasion stunned his entire front line anyway. But I'm not sure it helps much either way, and still leaves the team vulnerable to pinballing.

Assume, for example, that the Skaven are playing a "tight" team like Orcs. If the Skaven line up in a spread on the line of scrimmage, then the Orcs can simply arrange their usual Cage with no problems:

Code: Select all

....X..X..X....
.Z.L.B.B.B.L.Z.
...............
....Z.....Z....
...............
...............
....T.....T....

Given that the Orcs are going to line up in this configuration most of the time, and the defensive setup won't prevent them from boxing, I can't see a compelling reason to use it. And there's always the risk of getting pinballed without forcing the Orcs to Blitz.

But it's probably just six of one, half a dozen of the other, really.

Cheers!

-Chet

Ancalagon · Post by **Ancalagon** » Mon Mar 25, 2002 3:14 pm

Norse: I know I have to make my "own starplayers", but maybe I hire the rest in decisive matches. And lizards have very few choices.

Marcus: I've played a few matches against skavens and I know that your scrim line allows you to make fast attack but I usually set up my defense against fast teams like an "V". I still haven't played dwarf against skavs but sure tackle does is work. On the other hand I played lizards against skavs and skavs have few to do.

Trambi · Post by **Trambi** » Mon Mar 25, 2002 3:48 pm

Ancalagon : Please no star players

Norse · Post by **Norse** » Mon Mar 25, 2002 3:50 pm

Listen to Trambi.....

Ancalagon · Post by **Ancalagon** » Mon Mar 25, 2002 4:04 pm

I'll try, I'll try... but the dark side calls me

And today I learnt this combo (frenzy/stripball) that can help me to take the ball from players like count...