Very Simple XP/Aging Rules

wolvendancer · Post by **wolvendancer** » Tue Oct 28, 2003 11:05 pm

Well, I'm back from a highly unexpected absence and ready to talk some Blood Bowl.

The XP rules in BB are, in a word, ^&&%$. People do unnecessary passes and put their teams through all sorts of contortions to spread TDs, Completions, and Casualities around. Why? Well, in BB, skills don't allow you to do things, doing things allow you to get skills.

What? The tail is wagging the dog, here.

Skills are developed in practice AND through experience. Not the experience of one single catch or scoring a TD, but the general experience of playing a game. Thus, the following replaces the SP system in BB:

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Every player active rolls on the following table after each game:

1-2 Zero Skill Points Awarded
3-4 One Skill Point Awarded
5-6 Two Skill Points Awarded

Random MVP: 4 Points

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That's it. You play, you get experience, you get better. Players will advance at slightly difference rates, but overall will keep pace with their brethren.

Note this actually GETS RID of a number of now useless rules. No need to say whether fouls get you SPs, or Secret Weapons get you SPs, etc.

Now, aging. Since the tail isn't wagging the dog anymore, we don't have to connect the two.

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After every 10-game season (or every ten games on the roster), each player rolls on the following table:

1 Player Ages - Roll on Aging Table
2-6 Player Does Not Age

For each additional year beyond the first the player plays, add +1 to the roll.

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Voila.

Comments?

Munkey · Post by **Munkey** » Tue Oct 28, 2003 11:13 pm

I think most people will find this a bit boring, I see your point but it's not really what people want.

The current system brings team management to the pitch, if you want to spread out the skills you need to spread out the TDs.

The other problem is despite the random factor teams are going to be levelling up in waves, it's going to be a tough game playing a team thats just 'crested' a wave when your team hasn't.

I've always seen the current skills as a manageable version of the way experience is really generated:

If you hit someone (Block) you get better at it, ideally this should be something like 0.1 experience, but eventually you will cause a casulty and get two SPPs, much easier to track.

wolvendancer · Post by **wolvendancer** » Tue Oct 28, 2003 11:22 pm

Munkey wrote:I think most people will find this a bit boring, I see your point but it's not really what people want.

The current system brings team management to the pitch, if you want to spread out the skills you need to spread out the TDs.

The other problem is despite the random factor teams are going to be levelling up in waves, it's going to be a tough game playing a team thats just 'crested' a wave when your team hasn't.

I've always seen the current skills as a manageable version of the way experience is really generated:

If you hit someone (Block) you get better at it, ideally this should be something like 0.1 experience, but eventually you will cause a casulty and get two SPPs, much easier to track.

Brings Team Management to the Pitch = Players and Teams doing Idiotic Things on the Pitch That Have No Bearing on the Game to Manipulate a Silly Experience System.

I don't agree with the 'waves' idea, either. It is true that there will be a bell-ish curve starting with the 3rd game and tapering off where players will get their first skill, but that's surely that's not a problem, especially when the League is playing the same amount of games.

If your point is that starting teams will have a disadvantage against experienced ones, well, that hardly differs anywhere you go.

Joemanji · Post by **Joemanji** » Tue Oct 28, 2003 11:47 pm

XP not a problem in BB. If it ain't broke....

wolvendancer · Post by **wolvendancer** » Tue Oct 28, 2003 11:52 pm

Nazgit wrote:XP not a problem in BB. If it ain't broke....

It favors certain positions. It favors certain teams. It is highly dependent on what race of team you are playing. It is tied to an awful game mechanic (aging). It makes owners do stupid things on the pitch that make no sense within the context of the game.

Sounds broke to me.

Joemanji · Post by **Joemanji** » Wed Oct 29, 2003 12:10 am

wolvendancer wrote:It favors certain positions.

Yes it does, separating out the stars of the team. It is balanced between teams though which it what's important.

It favors certain teams. It is highly dependent on what race of team you are playing.

I don't agree. Do you mean that scoring teams earn more SPP than bashy ones? Or the other way round? I think it is as perfectly balanced as you could wish for. In BB, a good coach will earn loads more SPP than a bad one, regardless of race.

It is tied to an awful game mechanic (aging). It makes owners do stupid things on the pitch that make no sense within the context of the game.

People dislike ageing. I don't. I think on a long enough timeline it is perfectly balanced. If you don't like ageing though, don't use it!

Sounds fine to me.

The 'blips' of people doing needless things to earn SPP make up a small % of the game, in my experience. Very small.

At the end of the day, no offense, your system is boring and the existing one is fun. Fun is more important than statistical niceties.

wolvendancer · Post by **wolvendancer** » Wed Oct 29, 2003 12:24 am

Yes it does, separating out the stars of the team.

Unnecessary. It is completely obvious who the stars are - they are the ones that score the late TD, make the saving block, knock out the other guy's thrower. How do you know who the star is on a real football team without seeing their stat sheet?

Tail wagging the dog again.

In BB, a good coach will earn loads more SPP than a bad one, regardless of race.

No, a good coach will win games and maybe a championship. See? Skills have become an end, not a means.

The 'blips' of people doing needless things to earn SPP make up a small % of the game, in my experience. Very small.

You already admitted that it added team management to the pitch. Every time you sacrifice a better play to get more people skills or avoid aging, it happens, and I suspect that is every game played.

At the end of the day, no offense, your system is boring and the existing one is fun. Fun is more important than statistical niceties.

Why? Players progress. Players get skills. Players age. There's randomness and rolling involved. Your players will become individuals. Teams still need a lot of attention and management.

Moreover, you can start to pay attention to what is really important. Who are the stars? Who's making the plays?

Post by **GalakStarscraper** » Wed Oct 29, 2003 1:40 am

Smallish problem.

The teams are not balanced under this type of system.

A Dwarf team after 12 games will be able to field a team with 2 skills on every player including the lineman.

Top rated Dwarf team in my league after 15 games has a 15 player team .. 1 with three skills, 5 with two skills, 5 with one skill, and 4 with no skills. His team is already very difficult to play against. Give those 9 other players on this squad 2 skills each and you have a Dwarven wall of Mighty Blow, Guard, Block, and Tackle ... no thank you, ever for such a system.

The current SPP system takes into account the turnover teams face vs their ability to get SPPs. In the end it works. If you look at leagues like the MBBL, http://www.midgardbb.com/MBBL/MBBL_RaceStats.htm , virtually all races hover around a 50% win rate. FUMBBL shows similar stats for the races. In this system, the races will quickly become out of balance against each other at 10 skills. An Elf team with 2 skills on each player is not the same as a Dwarf team with 2 skills on each player. AND don't even get me started on how bad this system would be with the Khemri, Ogre, and Vampire teams.

Sorry ... the tail wagging the dog is perfectly okay.

Galak

wolvendancer · Post by **wolvendancer** » Wed Oct 29, 2003 2:12 am

Smallish problem.

The teams are not balanced under this type of system.

A Dwarf team after 12 games will be able to field a team with 2 skills on every player including the lineman.

That's true. So will every other team. Note that the number of skillpoints awarded per game is basically the same - it is just more-or-less optimally spread out.

Top rated Dwarf team in my league after 15 games has a 15 player team .. 1 with three skills, 5 with two skills, 5 with one skill, and 4 with no skills. His team is already very difficult to play against. Give those 9 other players on this squad 2 skills each and you have a Dwarven wall of Mighty Blow, Guard, Block, and Tackle ... no thank you, ever for such a system.

A few problems.

1. He will not have started with 15 players, he will have started with eleven. All 15 players would not be at the same level of development.

2. Each of his starting 11 players will average 1 point per game plus approximately 5 points off of the random MVP. Therefore, each player will on average have 20 SPP by game 20. So, yes, each will have 2 skills. Two of his three extra players will probably have only one.

3. Are dwarves in your league earning on average less SPP than other teams? That was poo-pooed earlier in this thread. Can you provide numbers or any documentation that spreading out the XP more will unbalance anything?

The current SPP system takes into account the turnover teams face vs their ability to get SPPs.

So, in your opinion, this would punish the fragile teams? I think something else would balance that out - elves, for instance, would have more skills AND be free to use their weapons AS weapons on the pitch. No more handicapping yourself for SPs. Passers pass, catchers catch.

In the end it works.

It has problems. It forces a style of metagaming that is inconsistent with itself. I could theoretically invent an XP system based on the number of times each coach could belch out the national anthem, but that doesn't mean it would be desireable.

If you look at leagues like the MBBL, http://www.midgardbb.com/MBBL/MBBL_RaceStats.htm , virtually all races hover around a 50% win rate.

Certainly.

FUMBBL shows similar stats for the races. In this system, the races will quickly become out of balance against each other at 10 skills. An Elf team with 2 skills on each player is not the same as a Dwarf team with 2 skills on each player. AND don't even get me started on how bad this system would be with the Khemri, Ogre, and Vampire teams.

I respect your BB experience, but do you have anything to back up your opinion? Is TRR faulty then, because it doesn't take this into account? If I take two TRR 100 teams and add 2 skills to every player, their TRR stays the same, regardless of race.

To be honest, I have a few years of BB experience myself (though nothing comapred to you) and I don't agree. I think the best balance argument to be made is that certain skills (Block, Dodge) are better than the rest, and so elves with their high AGI could become unbalanced later in development. Isn't it readily agreed that, next to Chaos, Elves are better late-League performers than early?

Post by **GalakStarscraper** » Wed Oct 29, 2003 3:45 am

wolvendancer wrote: 2. Each of his starting 11 players will average 1 point per game plus approximately 5 points off of the random MVP. Therefore, each player will on average have 20 SPP by game 20. So, yes, each will have 2 skills.

That's still a Dwarven wall of Mighty Blow, Block, Guard, and Tackle on 5 to 6 Longbeards. I don't know of two many Elf teams that would look forward to playing an Elf team with 2 skills on 11 players against a Dwarf team with the same.

Can you provide numbers or any documentation that spreading out the XP more will unbalance anything?

Funny, I can turn this question easily around and ask where is your documentation that spreading it out doesn't unbalance the system.

But yes I have some evidence of this already in my league. My best Dwarf team this season is not the one that is top winning over its life time. My top Dwarf team this season is one were the Longbeards have 16 SPPs each. So despite being basically equal TRs ... this Dwarf team is doing better than the one that has taken 2nd in the league two seasons running because IMO its skills are more spread out across the Longbeards.

So, in your opinion, this would punish the fragile teams? I think something else would balance that out - elves, for instance, would have more skills AND be free to use their weapons AS weapons on the pitch. No more handicapping yourself for SPs. Passers pass, catchers catch.

And Dwarves will have Mighty Blow, Guard, Block, and Tackle which will make those Block/Dodge Lineelfs into paste on the line, difficult to get through, and have skills that are for the most part negated by the Dwarf skills.

It has problems.

In your opinion. Fanatic has been getting a ton of fan mail talking about the greatest release of BB ever being LRB 2.0. A system that has worked well and proven balanced time and time again in league play since 1994 does have to much of a hole in its structure.

Is TRR faulty then, because it doesn't take this into account? If I take two TRR 100 teams and add 2 skills to every player, their TRR stays the same, regardless of race.

My opinion ... yes TR is faulty in your system. Teams are not equals at 2 skills a piece. Chaos with mutations, Skaven with mutations, and Ogre team with Block and Pro on all the Ogres and Side Step and Sure Feet on all the Goblins would not be the same as a Wood Elf team with 2 skills on each player.

Isn't it readily agreed that, next to Chaos, Elves are better late-League performers than early?

Yes, but their opponent's have the same lopside development that they do. Put 2 skills on every player and you'll greatly change the game balance.

You keep asking me for my proof ... which I find interesting since you are the one arguing for change. But I'd be more than willing to offer proof. We take a beginning Elf team of your choice of race and put 12 games under it statistically and do the same to a Dwarf team ... we can agree on assumptions of a gold timeline as well. Have your choice of Elf coaches play my choice of Dwarf coaches via PBeM ... I'm pretty sure I now what the outcome will be. Or I'll play an Ogre #2 or BB Annual 2003 Ogre team under your system after 12 games against any Elf team you desire in PBeM.

2 skills on every player is not an equal system of BB development.

I really shudder to think of the Chaos team with Block and RSC on 4 Beastmen or Chaos Warriors after only 12 games for the LOS ... yikes.

Galak

Xtreme · Post by **Xtreme** » Wed Oct 29, 2003 4:36 am

Besides all of the things pointed out by Galak anther problem I have is that this system would Treat good and bad coaches as the same. A bad coach would have a team that would rival a good coaches after the first season. Shouldn't those of us who are better have better palyers to show for our work. And why should the thrower who can't figure out how to pick up the ball gain Accurate or strong arm because he played in so many games?

Tim · Post by **Tim** » Wed Oct 29, 2003 10:45 am

Galak is right.

You can already see a similar effect to the one created by your system in tournament play, where usually one skill is awarded for one player after every game.

One of the toughest tournament games i ever had was against a lizardmen team in round 6 with 5x guard on their Sauri. Something that never would happen in league play, as Sauri can almost only get SPP on Cas at a very slow rate.

At T5:2, where 2 Skill Rolls were awarded randomly after every game, my Chaos Dwarfs were going through the opponents like a hot knife through butter with 1 Mighty Blow/Guard CD and 4 Mighty Blow CDs (and a lucky STR4 Hobgoblin).

It's important for the team balance in Blood Bowl that certain strong player types (Black Orcs, Longbeards/CDs, Sauri, Mummys, Big Guys) develop at a slower rate than others.

Although it's a little strange to pass to a free lineman instead of a free catcher to spread SPP out, things like that happen in sports. Coaches leave their stars on the bench in an "easier" game to have them fit for an important game afterwards. Coaches sent out the bench players for play if they have a big lead that secures the victory. So i don't see a big problem here. And i love the extra tension of an unneeded handover just to give a lineman an touchdown (both, as as the scorer or defender), it's a strategical vs. tactical decision.

Robotorz · Post by **Robotorz** » Wed Oct 29, 2003 6:04 pm

Amen Brother Galak, Brother Tim!

wolvendancer · Post by **wolvendancer** » Wed Oct 29, 2003 6:51 pm

Fear I might have to bow to the collected wisdom of the board, here. Thanks for the help, everyone.

Back to the drawing board!

Fraggle Chris · Post by **Fraggle Chris** » Fri Oct 31, 2003 10:46 am

But after all, the aging sytsem you suggest is far more better as the current one.
Why should a player aging when he get a spp roll?
He should age after a couple of games.
Guesss you play fifty games with a team and a lineman has no spp roll, he is as fit as ever. But your other lineman who had the "luck" to gain the experience in your first game already aged?
It´s unfair unlogical and so we use a similar art of ageing sytem you suggested.

To the debate over the spp-system i have nothing to add. The current one is fun, easy to manage, balanced and so on...