Brand new player looking for advice

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voyagers_uk
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Re: Brand new player looking for advice

Post by voyagers_uk »

Digger I applaud you for your concise and well thought out post... I have nothing to add.

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dboeren
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Re: Brand new player looking for advice

Post by dboeren »

Pagan wrote:There isn't any specific way to rank the teams as each league will have players of different skills, and if you just ask players you will get different results on what 'tier' teams are.
Yeah, I've noticed some of that. One local guy claims that Skaven are "easy mode", basically similar to what Digger Goreman was saying about Elves - prancing around with their speed and Dodge and whatnot. The other guy who's played before thinks they're fine.

I think we're going to end up with:
1 Chaos (me)
1 Chaos Dwarves *or* Pro Elves (experienced guy #1, hasn't decided)
1 Skaven (experienced guy #2)
1 Dwarves (newbie)
1 Undead of some sort (newbie, but not until November)


In addition, I'm trying to get some of my friends with an XBox to pick up the game so we can maybe get in some occasional online games with it.

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Re: Brand new player looking for advice

Post by DoubleSkulls »

Blood Bowl isn't a static game so balance is a particularly tough concept. Teams have varying abilities against each other (rock, paper, scissors effect) and others are better or worse at lower or higher TVs.

Several teams, including Chaos, start out relatively weak and get better at higher TVs.
Several teams, including undead, start out relatively strong and get worse at higher TVs.
Some teams, e.g. Amazons, are strong against many teams but weak against others.

Officially
Tier 3 Halflings, Goblins, Ogres
Tier 2 Vampires
Tier 1.5 Chaos Pact, Slann, Underworld
Tier 1 everyone else

Across all TV levels and opposition tier 1 ought to be roughly even. That is generally taken to mean within a 45% to 55% record.

I think coaching skill is a much bigger factor than than 10% range in most table top leagues, and the impact of favourable skill rolls, MVPs and winning have a much bigger effect than the team you choose.

Obviously in very long running leagues the differences can be more significant, but then you can always do the "best with XXX" trick :)

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Digger Goreman
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Re: Brand new player looking for advice

Post by Digger Goreman »

voyagers_uk wrote:Digger I applaud you for your concise and well thought out post... I have nothing to add.
Thanks much.... :orc:

Double Skulls points, accurately, to a lot of variables that make it deucedly hard to say just what is what in respect to BB tiers and whatever might be the reality of team ratings....

Some things that do make it too easy in BB:
Ag4
Leap (really should count leapt to tackle zones) on Ag4/Ag5 :roll: /Ag3 with VLL....
More than two of any positional type
Initial/Eventual spamming of skills (but especially initial)
Journeymen (favors elves tremendously, but also "cheapo linemen" teams like Undead)
Stat increases

So much of what we'll talk about is relegated to Academic and Theory Bowl by not having the LRB process anymore.... So, again, what is is what is....

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LRB6/Icepelt Edition: Ah!, when Blood Bowl made sense....
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dboeren
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Re: Brand new player looking for advice

Post by dboeren »

Digger Goreman wrote: Some things that do make it too easy in BB:
Ag4
Leap (really should count leapt to tackle zones) on Ag4/Ag5 :roll: /Ag3 with VLL....
More than two of any positional type
Initial/Eventual spamming of skills (but especially initial)
Journeymen (favors elves tremendously, but also "cheapo linemen" teams like Undead)
Stat increases
Stat increases (particularly to the "good" stats of AG/ST) are fairly uncommon (1/12 chance, and may compete with taking a doubles choice). They're nice when you get them of course but one guy can't be everywhere and you shouldn't have many of them. On my XBox Chaos team I do have a +ST Chaos Warrior which has been useful on the line and a +AG Beastman which I've made into my designated ball handler but other than that he hasn't been a big factor.

I do agree with too many (quality) initial skills being a point of imbalance. Teams like Amazons or Norse start out with a treasure trove of very good skills, not the weak ones you'd never really pick like Thick Skull. It seems to me like it would be very hard for a similar team with a much weaker starting skill pool (Humans for instance) could compete with them. Having access to an Ogre is nice, but he's one guy and pretty expensive. I have no issue with "signature" skills for a team to give them flavor, but perhaps it would be better if these were only on selected players and less of the whole team. Also, those selected players might not always be the positionals, a player might need to choose between taking a Lineman with Block, Dodge, or whatever versus a Thrower who has Pass & Sure Hands but lacks the other skill. Interesting choices are interesting.

I'm not sure I can agree with a blanket "no more than 2 of each position" though. That seems like it would put a big dent in the diversity of the game because right now this is a major differentiating factor for some teams. I think this would only be doable if you added additional positions. For instance, if a team can currently take four Blitzers, you could redefine them to have two Blitzers and two Blockers, etc... Not necessarily all teams, for some dropping a position to 0-2 could be part of fixing balance issues. For instance, I think Amazons could be dropped to 0-2 Blitzers and still compete, but it would be harsh on Humans. Obviously some of the more special teams or those with fewer than normal player types would be totally exempt. 0-2 Vampires? No thanks! :)

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Re: Brand new player looking for advice

Post by dboeren »

So as I've been playing the XBox on Medium it's really gotten too easy and I can expect to win almost every game. As much as I hate to abandon my semi-developed teams I really need to migrate to Hard difficulty and start new ones.

I decided that it's not a good thing to become over-reliant on being the bashy team so I'm postponing Chaos and started a Human team. Quite a different experience! I feel like the underdog in most of my matches getting slapped around by Black Orcs, Saurus, etc... and only having a single player on my side with STR > 3. But, for all that we are still winning. We've got to work a lot more at it of course and there have been some real nail-biters. Last night I won a game in double-overtime that I really didn't think we'd pull out.

I'm doing considerably less hitting than with Chaos because we're just not equipped for it, but I think overall learning to win with more guys just standing there is a good thing. Doing less = fewer rolls = fewer chances to fail and turnover. The downside is that we're skilling up a lot slower without those casualties. The Blitzers and Thrower are doing OK but not one of my Linemen has more than 2SPP yet. Well, that may not be 100% accurate. One of them died and I don't know how much he had. I'd like someone to level sooner or later so we can maybe get a Kick or Tackle guy. I should probably start making an effort to let my Linemen take the Block when we're up instead of having them assist the more reliable Blitzers to see if I can score an occasional casualty SPP.

The two keys so far have been our speed (and using more GFI's when it matters such as marking a ball carrier), and our passing game. I know the conventional wisdom tends to suggest that passing is for Elves and fools, but I don't think we'd be doing nearly so well without it. My first skill on my Thrower was Accurate and I never attempt anything longer than a Short pass. Probably 5/6 of my passes are Quick, Short only if somehow I can't get any closer even with a GFI such as a recent game where some stupid Orcs were in the way. I don't have any Catchers yet, I spent my gold on a 4th reroll and replacing my dead Lineman, so I try to get the ball to a Blitzer since they're faster and harder to knock down. If it works out right, hopefully it's the Blitzer who rolled doubles and picked up Dodge but that's not always possible.

The guides I've read seem to be right on the money that Humans are a reactive team. We're OK at doing most stuff so you've got to be ready to change gears quickly and capitalize on mistakes by the enemy team.

Anyway, the lessons learned here should transition well to playing most teams BECAUSE the Humans are so unspecialized and hopefully improve my play with all the teams.

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voyagers_uk
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Re: Brand new player looking for advice

Post by voyagers_uk »

if you are winning on medium, you will win on hard (but more easily) as the computer takes less risks... Medium is actually the right balance...

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dboeren
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Re: Brand new player looking for advice

Post by dboeren »

Really? I'll have to test that out. Since I swapped to a new team at the same time it's hard to say which change is responsible.

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Re: Brand new player looking for advice

Post by Heff »

voyagers_uk wrote:if you are winning on medium, you will win on hard (but more easily) as the computer takes less risks... Medium is actually the right balance...
+1

play it on easy and watch the machine take insane risks and beat you. Better learn on MM "a den of villainy" but one where the opponent has a brain "Mostly"

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Re: Brand new player looking for advice

Post by Piousman »

I agree that Medium seems the right balance. On Easy you will get scored against once in a while, when the AI manages those 5 4+'s in a row. On hard they turtle in their half of the field and just sit there, giving you the time to break down their defense.

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