A problem with the LRB

[roysorlie]

Ok, first off, let me just state that I think the LRB is by far the best ruleset thus far. Teams are balanced, and the rules are for the most part good, (excepting the possibility to misuse piling on, and the interception rule stating the int attempt be made BEFORE the pass is. Doesn't make sense, and yes, yes I know it's just a game mechanic. Still think it's silly)

But, I have a problem with the following. Unless you are in a large league, (and most BB'ers arent. The vast majority of BB'ers are just a couple of friends playing the game, and have no idea, or knowledge of the larger leagues and online leagues), you have a big problem entering a league, where the other's teams are already developed. Before, you used to be able to grow rapidly, with extra MVP's and the random event money cards. This meant, even if you lost, the team would catch up fairly quickly.

The way it is now, a fresh team has close to no incentive playing a higher ranked team, (excepting the challenge in itself). You have to expect to lose, you will get beaten upon alot, (due to opponents block skill, MB etc). You will have more injured players, and since you will lose all you games, probably by alot, your FF will decrease. So, your FF will decrease, you'll lose most games. This making income hard come by. Your team will be beaten around alot more, making you suffer more injuries. It's a negative spiral.

On the other hand, the higher ranked team will have a field day. They will easily win, giving them more money, and more FF. They will get heaps of SPP due to injuries and TD's they are bound to get.

So the weaker team will develope very slowly, and the stronger team will develope much quicker.

I guess you all see the problem here.

In real life, a very good team will learn nothing from playing a much weaker team. It is not much use for them. The weaker team on the other hand, might pick up quite a few good ideas and plays from playing someone better. This makes sense, you improve by competeing against stronger, better opponents.

In the LRB, unless your opponents either agree to all begin new teams, or promise not to use skills like DP, MB, PO and even possibly block, the guy who had to retire his team, or the new frind who wanted to join, willl never get ahead.

This isn't good for the game, or for the players. I had people quitting my league, because of this very issue.

Something has to be done. I'm not neccasarily saying bring back the extra MVP's. But maye a concept like, if the team is that much stronger, the stronger team get's -1 SPP for all actions, and the weaker team gets +1 for all actions.

Now, it will be a problem basing it just on TR difference, because we all know the difference between 100 and 150 is a lot greater than between 150 to 200. So it has to be based on some form of table.

We should discuss how to improve this problem. Any ideas other than the one I've presented?

[Fronko]

Despite the idea you had, there is one other option: ultiple leagues/divisions. As you said, your group is probably small. Its the same with us, we have a core group of six players, with one or two joining occasionally. So, we all have several teams, divided into divisions. The teams we started with first are the most experienced teams. Then, when a few guys joined, we kept those teams, but started a lower division with new teams, so everyone was on equal level. We have fixed play schedules and after a season everyone decides by team rating, which team goes to first and which to second division. There has also been a time where we had three divisions, i.e. everyone had three teams.

Now everytime someone new joins up, he'll start his team in the lowest division, which is always the one with lowest team rating. And as every team gets a heavy mauling from time to time, it happens that they go down to little more than 100 TR.

In addition you might use some extra retirement rules, like every player who has more than 50 SPP at the end of season leaves the team under certain circumstances...

[DoubleSkulls]

The real problem is the weakness of the handicap table - results vary wildly in effectiveness so you can play a difference of 11 and win thanks to a good handicap, or play with the difference of 80 and just get rubbish.

Hopefully this is one of things being addressed in the rules review.

[Old Man Draco]

Roy, I think you're right! Bring back the extra MVP's.

Also the TR differences for the handicap table are not balaced. Maybe for medium rated vs low rated, but high rated teams should not have the need of a handicap table any more.

We still play with the card thingies. But still its ridiculous that a team with rating TR 235 gets two handicap rolls against a team with TR 265 . There is not much difference in the teams but still... Maybe a cap above where you don't get rolls any more could help out there.

Let fouls of higher teams be spotted on a 5+ instead of the normal ruling.
Give the newbie team an extra apoth.

And get back those special play cards!!!!

[DoubleSkulls]

Roy, I think you're right! Bring back the extra MVP's.

IMO this isn't the answer.

Making the handicap table stronger and only effect the game being played is a better solution.

[roysorlie]

Despite the idea you had, there is one other option: ultiple leagues/divisions.

Sure, but not everybody has the time, or wish to play several leagues. Some guys only have one team, some guys just like to play one team a time. Your method can work for guys who have the time to manage several teams. If that is the case, it is a solution, but it's just a way to get around a flaw with the ruleset basically. And wouldn't it cause people to have several teams in the highest division? You could risk having to play vs. yourself if you set up a cup or something?

The real problem is the weakness of the handicap table - results vary wildly in effectiveness so you can play a difference of 11 and win thanks to a good handicap, or play with the difference of 80 and just get rubbish.

Hopefully this is one of things being addressed in the rules review.

Well, certainly, the handicap table as it is now is rubbish, and boring to boot. But what can you really do with the handicap table, if no resuslts are supposed to directly either stop a TD, or help score one, or give more money and spp? The opponent will still have all the skills, block, MB, catch, dogde, PO, etc, whereas you team has none. It will not do much to help you gain more SPP in reality, just annoy your opponent.

I think you're right! Bring back the extra MVP's.

Also the TR differences for the handicap table are not balaced. Maybe for medium rated vs low rated, but high rated teams should not have the need of a handicap table any more.

I'm not sure bringing em back the way they used to be is the proper solution. But however we manage to boost the growth of new teams, it's important to somehow manage to restrict this to new teams, and not give benefits for teams up above 200. or if so, alot less, even though the TR difference is the same as with the lower teams.

My point is basically, it should be beneficial for a new team to play higher ranked teams, win OR lose. It makes it more fun to be the underdog.

Not saying that the underdog team should win, but it should be worth while for them. Like, maybe, if you the underdog, then you won't get the -1 modifer to FF if you lose, and maybe 2+ if you win. Maybe like I suggesten give more SPP for successful actions, because they are much harder to achive. Maybe have a sponsorship deal help boost with a little money, for the underdog only.

Make it easy to get ahead in a league where all the opponenets are stronger, and at the same time make sure when all teams are strong, the benefits don't come into play.

[noodle]

We still use the extra MVPs and Special play cards for this exact reason. I've never seen anything wrong with extra MVPs based on handicap - to me it represented the extra experience a team/player would get from playing such a superior team...

And the current handicap is a bit wet.

[Fronko]

Despite the idea you had, there is one other option: ultiple leagues/divisions.

Sure, but not everybody has the time, or wish to play several leagues. Some guys only have one team, some guys just like to play one team a time. Your method can work for guys who have the time to manage several teams. If that is the case, it is a solution, but it's just a way to get around a flaw with the ruleset basically. And wouldn't it cause people to have several teams in the highest division? You could risk having to play vs. yourself if you set up a cup or something?

Well, if you are not willing/able to spend the time on multiple teams, you are right. But how often do you guys meet? We met once a week, so we about manage to get both division through in about half a year, a bit longer, if you count tourneys. Speaking of those: If you hold several tournaments, and every team can only participate in one (so no two teams of a coach can meet), you have solved that problem. Combine this with a hidden decision, who participates in which tourney and you get a lot of fun. Off course, then you might have larger TR differences, but by that time your team should be strong enough to survive a heavy beating.

[DoubleSkulls]

But what can you really do with the handicap table, if no resuslts are supposed to directly either stop a TD, or help score one

Sorry, are you trying to tell me Virus or In the Bag don't have a dramatic effect on the game?

Some (e.g. Palmed Coin) are almost useless others can be critical.

I'd actually like to see more results that help the underdog rather than hurt the higher TR team.

I'd like to see no results that have a permanent effect on TR (so no bonus money or MVP results).

[Princelucianus]

AFAIK, the extra MVP's are not granted, because your teamrating would otherwise grow too quickly and your FF couldn't keep up. With the new winnings table (with all the minusses) it would make you run out of winnings to quick to buy a full team....

Lucy

[roysorlie]

Sorry, are you trying to tell me Virus or In the Bag don't have a dramatic effect on the game?

Some (e.g. Palmed Coin) are almost useless others can be critical.

I'd actually like to see more results that help the underdog rather than hurt the higher TR team.

I'd like to see no results that have a permanent effect on TR (so no bonus money or MVP results).

Oh no, not at all, those have a dramatic effect on the game. But as we both said, the handicap table as it is now is rubbish. Set aside my opinion the cards are more fun than a table, the results could still larely be the same on both solutions, only more easily kept hidden on cards. (adds tension imo).

My point is it should be beneficial and worthwhile for a low TR team to play a high TR team, and less benificial for a high TR team to play a low TR team. If you have a TR 100 team, and play against a TR 150 team, the TR 150 team should easily win, but the TR 100 team should learn alot, and still benefit for their playing someone that much stronger. More experiance, cutos for taking on a stronger team.

The way it is now, the stronger team has all the benefits, and the weaker team has hardly any short term benefit, (I.E Lose game, casualties, reduced FF and few SPP) and this is a bigger problem long term ( difficulties fielding enogh players, FF is very low, alot of injuries, takes a very long time to develope team)

Sorry Ian, I think, for new teams, and up to a TR of 150, I think there should be a handicap working long term for teams. But as teams start to reach 200, all benefits should be removed. The team ios developed, and no handicap is neccasery any longer.

This in not much of a problem for large leagues, og online leagues. But it is a big problem for the thousands of small leagues of a couple of friends, who play BB every now and then.


And it annoys several others more frequent players represented on this board.

[roysorlie]

AFAIK, the extra MVP's are not granted, because your teamrating would otherwise grow too quickly and your FF couldn't keep up. With the new winnings table (with all the minusses) it would make you run out of winnings to quick to buy a full team....

Lucy

Easily enough solved by granting a new or very low TR team playing a stronger opponent a bonus on the FF table.

Lose = no modifer
tie = +1
Win = +2

This of course only applies for new teams playing very much higher teams, and stops having an effect when a team is reasonably developed. (approx 150-170??)

[Grumbledook]

When large teams play low teams its not just a fat cash cow for them

usually the low team will have a ff thats too low for the gate to get the high team and money at all, sure they might win but that doesn't guarentee the ff will go up either

the lower team will get more money from what should be a higher ff on the better team

you were harping on about things in the LRB not making sense (interceptions for example) but if your playing with the real world then a newly put together team isn't usually going to stand a chance against an established side, no matter what the sport

new teams coming in usually don't do very well, usually they would have to work their way up through divisions so would start off playing poorer teams anyawy (in football at least) or iirc in american football the texas houstens (is that right?) didn't do very well at all last season after joining the nfl

ok all thats moot anyway as this is a board game not a real sport

with a tweaked handicap table (which is going to happen anyway) this problem will get somewhat solved, though i think its more down to individual leagues to introduce some rules to boost starting teams if the need it. This is due to the fact you can't cover rules for this due to the great mumber of ways leagues can be run.

You could let the starter team roll some randomly applied skills to certain players for exmaple, or let them play some off season friendlies to start with, to get an initial boost

there are loads of different ways you could run a league to stop the small teams facing the large teams all the time, i think its more down to the league commisioners to sort something out with their league rather than having an awkward set of rules in the rulebook

[Old Man Draco]

AFAIK,

AFAIK?

Maybe you could help them by giving them a random Big Guy for the first couple of matches only. The players would be protected a bit more and be able to grow. It doesn't affect TR or SPP or winnings and you still get to build op your team.

I think if your team has a TR of approx 170 you have several players with skills so they can take care of themselves. Above that no random Big Guys allowed. Beneath that, look at the handicap. Maybe one BG per 25 handicap, but that would have to be tested first!

It gives you a chance in the game as well! Disadvantage is that it doesn't represent the fact that the opponent is stronger because of all the matches they allready played.

[Grumbledook]

afaik = as far as i know