Adding more variety to skill selection

[spubbbba]

*Disclaimer, this is all my own ideas and in no way is 90% of it stolen from a thread Darkson posted a while back.

I’m well aware that we’ll probably never get a lrb7, but in the highly unlikely event of it happening I’d like to try and encourage more skill diversity.

Whilst overall I prefer crp to lrb4 one of the things I dislike most it is that you are almost forced to pick from just a small handful of skills. Also for many players doubles (and stat increases, but I’m not covering those here) are not really worth it anymore. I’d still want coaches to be rewarded for intelligent skill choice and not be given too much of an advantage by lucky skill rolls. But I’d like to try and make the lesser skills more appealing to get away from cookie cutter teams. One way would be to change how the skills work, but this is a very tricky prospect and you risk just swapping about the must haves, mid range and not worth it skills.

So the 1st change would be introducing 5k steps to player and skill costs, we did have these in lrb4 for mercs so I’m sure we could handle it again. This will allow more precise cost adjustments, especially useful when applied to a common skill or a 0-4 player.

The 2nd would be to split skills into 3 tiers, Must haves, mid-range and poor with different costs. Below are how I’d split the skills, but ideally I’d love to have stats on which are taken the most and least by each player type on both normal and double rolls. I know FUMBBL did this back in the early days. I’m pretty confident block would be number 1, but it would be interesting to see what percentage of players took some of the less skills.

General
Must Have – Block
MID-RANGE – Wrestle, frenzy, dirty player, kick, tackle, dauntless, sure hands, fend
Poor – Strip ball, pro, shadowing, passblock, kick off return

Agility
Must Have – Dodge
MID-RANGE – sidestep, jump up, diving tackle, sure feet, leap
Poor – catch, diving catch, sneaky git, sprint

Passing
Must Have – Leader
MID-RANGE – pass, accurate
Poor – safe throw, NOS, Dump off, HMP

Strength
Must Have – Guard, Mighty Blow, Piling On
MID-RANGE – Stand Firm, Break tackle, Grab, Juggernaut
Poor – Thick Skull, Strong Arm, Multiple Block

Mutations
Must Have - Claw
MID-RANGE – Extra arms, 2 heads, tentacles, Foul appearance, big hand, horns
Poor – disturbing presence, very long legs, prehensile tail

I’d probably keep the 10K extra for doubles as some players do really benefit from those (guard for linemen or elves and MB on wolves) but thought about the idea of discount skill packages where on doubles you get 2 linked skills for 30TV.

Some of these are serious and others a bit silly, something like;
Expert Interceptor – Passblock and catch
You’re one ugly mother – Foul appearance and Disturbing presence (only for players with mutation access already)
A safe pair of hands – Safe throw and sure hands
Long Bomb John – HMP and strong arm
Dirty sneak – Dirty player and sneaky git (stunties only?)
Death from above – Leap and Dirty Player (one for big guys)
I just want a huuuug – Tents and shadowing (again player needs to be able to take mutations)


Making the core skills more expensive to take would help those teams that start with lots of them (dwarfs, zons and norse spring to mind). So i’d want to adjust some teams to take this into account. At it’s most basic you could add 5k for each must have skill the player starts with and subtract 5k for each poor skill. But I’d like to use the extra 5k steps to adjust some teams and try to lessen their starting power but increase their mid and high TV strength. With the increase to core skill cost the hope would be that high TV advantages like mass blodge or clawpomb would be more expensive.

So off the top of my head I’d make the following changes.
Humans – stay as is.
Orcs – Blitzers 85k, Troll 115K
Dwarfs – Blocker 75K, Trollslayer 95K
Chaos – stay as is
High Elves – Blitzers 105k
Wood Elves – Wardancers – 130k, catchers - 95k (maybe)
Undead – Mummies -125k, ghouls – 75k
Khermri – stay as is
Skaven – Gutters – 85k
Necro – Werewolves – 125k, ghouls – 75k (I’d drop golems in price though).
Ogres, goblins, vamps and halfings – stay as is
Amazons – I want to completely redesign the roster but would make linewomen 55k and blitzers 95k
Pact – troll – 115k, marauders 55k (either that or remove strength access)
Norse – Berserkers 95k, linemen 55k

[Hitonagashi]

Strip ball is in the wrong category. Any skill a wardancer regularly takes is not a T3 skill .

[burgun824]

Wardancers don't count because they all start out in the class of "Things that must die immediately."

I don't think the categories are that off. I'm just not sure about calling those skills poor. Some of the "poor" skills are very effective if taken in the proper build. They're just not worth it for most pieces to spend the TV on.

I also am probably not the greatest person to be commenting on this topic though because I prefer bland developments for the majority of players. I think it helps simplify the game but not to a level that is overly boring. The options are still there for fine tuning your stars but overall I think must have skills are must have for a reason. They deserve to be better in that regard. I'm not a big fan of the idea of leveling out the skills to encourage more variety just for the sake of being different.

I think this is an iteresting idea and I certainly think it opens up options for a lot of fun house rules but I would probably hate this if it were made gospel.

EDIT: Human blitzers are over-priced. That's my only other constructive comment right now.

[MattDakka]

EDIT: Human blitzers are over-priced. That's my only other constructive comment right now.

Human Catchers and Ogre too;
Khemri Blitzras should have Thick Skull or cost less, the Tomb Guardians with Decay are awful;
Snotlings are too expensive, they should cost 10k or 15k;
Big Guys generally speaking are too expensive compared to their usefulness.

[burgun824]

Human Catchers and Ogre too;
Khemri Blitzras should have Thick Skull or cost less, the Tomb Guardians with Decay are awful;
Snotlings are too expensive, they should cost 10k or 15k;
Big Guys generally speaking are too expensive compared to their usefulness.

I agree with all of this except I don't think that human catchers are over-priced, I think they're under strengthed.

However, I'm not sure we need to turn this topic into another "what teams need to be nerfed/buffed" thread.

[spubbbba]

Wardancers don't count because they all start out in the class of "Things that must die immediately."

I don't think the categories are that off. I'm just not sure about calling those skills poor. Some of the "poor" skills are very effective if taken in the proper build. They're just not worth it for most pieces to spend the TV on.

I also am probably not the greatest person to be commenting on this topic though because I prefer bland developments for the majority of players. I think it helps simplify the game but not to a level that is overly boring. The options are still there for fine tuning your stars but overall I think must have skills are must have for a reason. They deserve to be better in that regard. I'm not a big fan of the idea of leveling out the skills to encourage more variety just for the sake of being different.

I think this is an iteresting idea and I certainly think it opens up options for a lot of fun house rules but I would probably hate this if it were made gospel.

EDIT: Human blitzers are over-priced. That's my only other constructive comment right now.

My list is pretty arbitrary really, ideally I would have actual data of which skills are the most and least taken to better refine the list. There is also the issue that some skills are great no matter how much you have, (most of the “Must Haves” like block, dodge, guard and MB) whilst others are good skills but you’ll only need 1 or possibly 2 (sure hands, leader, kick etc).

I would want to avoid overly punishing coaches for taking the best skills. But I feel that some skills are so much better than others that we are forced down just a few development paths. If lrb7 were to delete all the skills I put in the “poor” category how much would that actually change things? I can honestly say in the 1200+ LRB4-6 games I’ve played and 100’s I’ve specced I’ve never seen passblock used.

The price changes to players were a bit of an afterthought and probably a distraction. We’d need to decide which teams should be altered and by how much which is always a hotly debated topic. It’s risky trying to compare similar players from different teams as you need to take their team-mates into consideration (a human catcher would be a must have for me if they were available to Khemri, nurgle or dwarfs).
I think it would be a useful tool to tweak the power levels, knocking human blitzers down to 85K would reduce most human teams by 20TV. Not a massive change, but it would help a little. In my experience most of the hybrid teams need subs as they perform badly when down in players so that would mitigate somewhat the cost of having subs. I agree with you on catchers, I think they are bad players and would prefer a buff over a price reduction. Even at 65, 60 50 or 50k the lack of strength and armour along with AG3 means I’d be unlikely to take more than 2.

[Shteve0]

I like the fun, themed linked skills suggestion. Would take some balancing, but as a shell it's cool.

Note of caution: tracking your opponent's skills and values might be hard work.

Another option of course is to just combine disturbing presence and foul appearance into one skill called 'disturbing presence', and likewise some of the other weaker skills. Would need some balancing, but possibly an option.

TBH, I think most skills have their place on some team or other - there's only a few that never get a look in (pass block being the poster child)

[Shteve0]

Also, it strikes me that the best way to broaden skill picks is to cut back on access. If Elves had only A access on normal, Dwarves had only S, Pact had only PM (lol!) you'd get more of the silly skills showing up more often.

[Smurf]

Isn't this based on 'standard format of play'?

It takes guts to play a different style but it ought to be explored despite the 'traditional' development.

I'm having fun with CDs. I will not take PO but will try to get MB, Frenzy, Guard and stand firm. Doubles will be claws. The BCs will go more traditional. Mino will most likely get Guard, Juggernaut and Standfirm with claws on a double. HGs, surehands and other skills to move quickly to get the ball and kick. Eventually pick up more HGs after 2nd reroll.

Am I playing to a standard format, no.

[spubbbba]

From that list of skills every one is totally what I’d consider a standard choice for Chaos Dwarfs, with the possible exception of frenzy. Even that one isn’t massively uncommon; I could see it as a late pick.

Now if you were taking something like passblock, break tackle with extra arms on doubles on the blockers over MB, Guard with claw on doubles then I’d consider that non-traditional.

Going by your reputation for thinking outside the box I’m bitterly disappointed smurf.

[Smurf]

I'm going for second skill Frenzy. Guard can come later

I won't sack linemen because they have skills. I like them with skills.

[mattgslater]

I like the idea of a 10k discount for some two-skill combos don't need to limit to access if it's just 10k off) and a 10k price increase for others.

MB, Claw, PO all +10k for each other skill in this track you already have.
Block or Wrestle plus Dodge: +10k.

Just two examples, of course... not that you need any others.

[Bludbowler]

A simple way to add variety in skill selection would be to prohibit players from adding any skill that would give them the the exact same skill combination as any other player on their team.

For example, if Player A adds Block as his first skill, Player B would have to take a different first skill to avoid an exact skill set match. However, if Player A takes his second skill before Player B takes his first skill, Player B could then take Block as his first skill because his skill set would not match that of Player A.

Thoughts?

[Chris]

Also, it strikes me that the best way to broaden skill picks is to cut back on access. If Elves had only A access on normal, Dwarves had only S, Pact had only PM (lol!) you'd get more of the silly skills showing up more often.

Now that is a fun idea, I think deserving of its own thread! (Hint, you should make one ).

[Chris]

A simple way to add variety in skill selection would be to prohibit players from adding any skill that would give them the the exact same skill combination as any other player on their team.

For example, if Player A adds Block as his first skill, Player B would have to take a different first skill to avoid an exact skill set match. However, if Player A takes his second skill before Player B takes his first skill, Player B could then take Block as his first skill because his skill set would not match that of Player A.

Thoughts?

That is also a simple variation you can do, though i think it favours teams that can score with all players as some like black orcs take a while to get tot he first skill then ages to get to the second if it isn't a blocking one.

A variation is simply to say every time you take a skill that someone on the team has already got you pay an extra 10k.