Getting back to FUMBBL after a hiatus

[RandomOracle]

Ugh. My 10SPP BOB with Block got a -AV, apothed to the other -AV. My other three BOBs are all well ahead of him, and I've got a ST4 Blitzer. I'm going to play my next match without him, and while he heals up I'll figure out if and how I want to replace him. Not a big perpetual gamer: my league instincts say I should keep him (he's still better than a rook), but what say you FUMBBLers and other long-view coaches?

I don't see any reason to keep him. -AV is a significant enough injury in the long run and he has nothing special to be kept around for. Besides, if the other BOBs are ahead of him, it should be easy enough to focus on scoring with this one.

[soranos]

Matt, why don't you join in a toruney? A small Smack or Royal Rookie Rumble will probably do that is where the most fun can be had.

[Hitonagashi]

Ugh. My 10SPP BOB with Block got a -AV, apothed to the other -AV. My other three BOBs are all well ahead of him, and I've got a ST4 Blitzer. I'm going to play my next match without him, and while he heals up I'll figure out if and how I want to replace him. Not a big perpetual gamer: my league instincts say I should keep him (he's still better than a rook), but what say you FUMBBLers and other long-view coaches?

He's earned his retirement. As RO says, score with him, and 2 MVP's will take a rookie back to where he is. No special skills.

If you were in a tourney, or about to go into one, I might keep him, but assuming you aren't, fire.

[mattgslater]

Matt, why don't you join in a toruney? A small Smack or Royal Rookie Rumble will probably do that is where the most fun can be had.

I told myself I'd play enough to work out most of the misclicks first. Frankly, I'm not close.

[Overhamsteren]

Did he magically recover from his injury?

I would consider keeping AV8 but maybe he would need 2 skills to stay. A blocker is just so much better with block than without.

[mattgslater]

Game's not over yet. Got disconnected mid-game, gonna pick up tomorrow night. So the AV loss isn't documented yet.

[mattgslater]

You know what my problem is? When I get behind, I start playing Martyball: I get too conservative. I had a chance to tie the game, but I lost 1-3 (really should have been 1-2; that last TD was just luck). I had a terrible T7, play-wise. I don't know why, but I lost track of time and thought it was still T6 for some reason, so I didn't get into scoring position. Wouldn't have mattered (fumbled the pass anyway), but still, it feels like a glaring mistake. Need to work on that.

This comes from a tendency to double down on errors. Did that too. It's not really my fault that I went down 1-2 (Blitz + Rain = c'est la vie, did a good job getting the comeback point), but the failure to equalize really comes down to the fact that I made one critical misclick, wasted a RR on it, and never really recovered. For want of that RR, I doubleskulled myself out of a cage on a play I never even should have tried, and it went downhill from there.

That's the difference between probcalc and risk management. This is a temperamental problem; I've seen professional sports coaches grapple with it their entire lives. I'll never be great until I get over it. It's not a matter of analysis: watching it after the fact, I see every little mistake quite crisply, thanks. Figuring out what I should have done isn't hard.

This little mini-debacle brings me down to 9-3-7, not abysmal, but not up to my snuff. Worse, it snaps a 5-game unbeaten streak. Still, in my last overall 12 FUMBBL games, I'm 9-1-2 (5-1-1 with this team), which ain't bad, especially since I've had some long streaks in that time where my heavy investment in MB just did not pay off, and the losses both felt kind of fluky. I played good games lots of coaches in the 155-165 range; given my experience against coaches much higher than that, I think I've finally reached the low end of what my CR range will be until I make the next jump in coaching skills.

Drognarkh got the MVP, and went up to 35 SPP. Being way up at 35 means he only needs 16 SPP. I gave him Mighty Blow, so he could conceivably advance again. Fend and Grab both tempted me. I feel like it's slightly premature for Grab, but I don't know if I want to wait for Fnorgrerm to get 10 more points. I'm also not sure I want to engage my inner overblocker like that... but it sure is fun!

No Eshmo in the next match. 1.77M gold. If I do really well, I may cut him and simply not replace him until somebody dies.

[Coach Grievous]

That's the difference between probcalc and risk management. This is a temperamental problem; I've seen professional sports coaches grapple with it their entire lives. I'll never be great until I get over it. It's not a matter of analysis: watching it after the fact, I see every little mistake quite crisply, thanks. Figuring out what I should have done isn't hard.

You outline the problem as a misclick, resulting in later difficulties. How's that probcalc vs risk management? Not following the AG5 leaping logic there. *puzzled*

But yeah, I feel you on the misclicks. They are my bane on the Cyanide game and they've messed up many plays for me. Not that they come up every game or anything, but just once is too much. The same happens with me in regards to time : making a mistake about what turn it exactly is is a helluva lot easier in online play for some reason, while I very rarely flub that up in table-top games.

[mattgslater]

Misclick is one thing. I could have recovered from that. It's the mistakes I piled onto it because I was frustrated.

[Coach Grievous]

Misclick is one thing. I could have recovered from that. It's the mistakes I piled onto it because I was frustrated.

Right. That's a never ending struggle with oneself, really - not to get frustrated with stupid mistakes or bad luck.

A recent example where I handled it well comes to mind, though. My orcs (7-1-1 atm) were playing a game vs a nicely advanced Nurgle team (on the Cyanide game) and I failed to score after receiving on the first half in rather apathetic fashion while losing a Black Orc to a badly hurt result.

The situation frustrated me because of being down a key player vs a good Nurgle team with good coaching, which would be a tedious struggle even with a full group. I switched my brain over to a different mode, thinking: "fine, the game's prolly lost or tied at best, so I'll take it as practice for man down situations like this." Flipping that switch got me back into the game with no frustration at all (indeed, turning the frustration into an advantage.. the more of it was present, the better training!). I did manage to win that with a daring play, following some solid but basic defense, but that's not really the point. At least for me, the "I'll take it as training" mind-set works wonders to reset my mentality.

[mattgslater]

Thanks!

[plasmoid]

Tsk, Matt.
Don't you have a playbook to finish

[mattgslater]

Last two games, I've really missed that RR. My Orcs are now three wins shy of my standard of W>(T+L). I bought the RR back, and I'm sitting at an uncomfortable 1940k. I forgot to fire Eshmoghrakh, but no matter: in the short run my SPP targets are Garkherl, Horkadakk, Jarromrolrg, and Mruagokh, so I can get enough Frenzy and Tackle, so Eshmo has at least a game or two to skill and get too good for me to cut him. Right now, Irigiorg can handle about three Dodge guys, but if I had two Tacklers and a Frenzy player, I wouldn't fear elves or Amazons.

[juck101]

I think you should fire the -av BoB as pointed above. Your team for me lacks direction so I cant really tell what massive difference between our orc play styles is! I play elf almost all the time and never really bash that well so maybe im talking rubbish on a orc thread.

Ok so you got 4 blitzers with Mb and no PO. I suggest 1x PO on practically any of them, but clearly the ma ag guy has other plans that should suit his current situation. I know you are a massive positional skill fan so Im surprised you dont have more SF. I think SF is a great 4th skill for orc positionals in general so I would roll that next on the +ma BZ.

I think you are also playing with less guard than I would do. Personally going against killers having more guard than them really should mean they are just taking a pot shot at a single guy every turn. That cant be so scary can it? I think 6 or 7 guard and man up to the killer should easy end in a close game, and frankly you should break a few av8s and its an even game in my theory bowl. So far fighting back worked in the few games I had of this description. Killers that suck dont have much guard, and even the great ones still wont out guard you.

I kinda think you have too many mb's and not enough guard blitzers. Certainly every BoB needs block guard also. I dont like your ss BoB but I expect you do so its all good. Still that's the 2nd extra guard I would have at this metric point compared, and i would be 100% happy with the 6 total I think I would picked.

I think the tool box skills you wanted on the first page have to wait
Frenzy comes after the next few guards and you probably need a PO instead of frenzy or tackle to hit back with any potency. Grab I dont get frankly this is a 4th level BoB skill that I doubt I will ever see. I cant see tackle being missing if you got this far with just one so far. You have 25 skills and 5 of them I would of changed but its a nice team you are making. The s4 mb blitzer with 3 assists get 3d mb which should be enough to finish any tricky wardancers or obscene elfs and GTS. maybe not perfect but you are not option-less vs heavy dodge.

last change is regarding your worried about killers. Hmmmmm. 2x20k linemen skills compared to an extra lineman for 10k more. I think its worth considering firing the linos and ride the scrimmage with naked lineorcs. Really cant see a block lineorc offering much more than a naked one. If you buy again its not like they skill that fast is it! 3 naked lineorcs is better than 2 blockers in my book, especially if you worried about hits.

The other meta skill is of course DP. I dont know why we don't hear more about fouling being the anti ClawPOMB meta choice. That has to be a consideration if you skill a lineorc as you can at least threaten and maybe even discourage PO in a tight match by having a DP player about. Any 200k killer on the deck should take a shoe.

I will have to have a look at your replays as they woudl be a good nights watching
Good luck. Dont forget if you have bad luck thats part of the game. Conservative play suits orcs so just stick to the bash and win the war.

[mattgslater]

Your team for me lacks direction so I cant really tell what massive difference between our orc play styles is! I play elf almost all the time and never really bash that well so maybe im talking rubbish on a orc thread.

Reefs-and-sharks. I like corralling my opponent and blocking them to death. It's when I get cute that I run into trouble.

Ok so you got 4 blitzers with Mb and no PO. I suggest 1x PO on practically any of them, but clearly the ma ag guy has other plans that should suit his current situation.

My style likes having its TZs intact. PO would have been a priority, but all my Blitzers have good rasons not to take it early. Besides, it's boring, and having a ton of MB and some PO makes it harder to find games.

I know you are a massive positional skill fan so Im surprised you dont have more SF. I think SF is a great 4th skill for orc positionals in general so I would roll that next on the +ma BZ

.Yeah, just don't have all the skills I need. Will soon get a rash of positioning skills. Wanted to mob up on MB so I could maximize my opportunism and play into my tendencies (I block a lot). Nuffle has responded by giving me crap AV rolls for 4 straight games. I make a humongous number of blocks (average 67 per match over the last 8 matches), but I have dealt less than 2.5% Cas for some reason, despite my massive load of MB, so I'm only averaging 1.5 Cas per match in that span.

I think you are also playing with less guard than I would do.

Me too. I want to get another Guard Blitzer, and maybe a third Guard BOB. For the +MA/AG guy, Jarromrolrg, his next skill depends on what I've got. If I don't have my #2 Tackle guy, it's him. If I do, he gets Guard. Pro after Tackle, Stand Firm after Guard. Garkherl is in a similar boat; either Tackle or Guard next, then Fend. But Guard is far from Job One. I get massive gobs of 2d blocks, no sweat.

I think the tool box skills you wanted on the first page have to wait

Frankly, I'm stronger and/or have more Guard than anybody I face. I have six +ST players and 4x Guard. I'm considering Grab for the SS guy, because Block/SS/Grab is rather frightening, and also because my SS'ing tendencies have gained traction in [R] and I'm playing against more than a few SS bulwarks. ST4/Frenzy/Block is just hard to ignore. 4d hits make for easy pows and lots of shoving.

last change is regarding your worried about killers. Hmmmmm. 2x20k linemen skills compared to an extra lineman for 10k more. I think its worth considering firing the linos and ride the scrimmage with naked lineorcs.

Not worried about deaths. Worried about AV breaks and KOs and Cas undoing my strength advantage, and about undoing all the delicate effort and lucky MVP breaks that have made my BOB squad so fearsome. Benchwarmers are useless there, until the drive is over. And drives against teams like that last a long time.

The other meta skill is of course DP. I dont know why we don't hear more about fouling being the anti ClawPOMB meta choice. That has to be a consideration if you skill a lineorc as you can at least threaten and maybe even discourage PO in a tight match by having a DP player about. Any 200k killer on the deck should take a shoe.

Yeah... I don't like fouling, but I'll be the first to admit I should be doing more of it.

Watch replays, and you'll see my use of SS. It's definitely better than Fend or Stand Firm, though you need Block to make good use of it. Watch Crogthnakh in particular, esp. since my recently-broken win streak started (it coincided with his getting Block). My problems mostly lie in taking too many good-odds bad risks, and in getting a little too flustered when Nuffle shuts me down improbably.