Talk Fantasy Football

I always struggle with committing to tackle in a tournament when fielding a quick team (I admit it's a no-brainer when you're coaching a bashy roster). The reason being that the principle nemesis for Elves, Skaven, etc. is always Dwarves and similar bashers. Tackle is a wasted skill in these tough matchups when you need every edge you can get.

Assuming the tourny is large and diverse, how do you break down when to use a skill choice on tackle when fielding an agile roster?

What skill would you choose instead to mitigate the chance of a wasted skill?

Warpstone - it depends what the player has already. If he has Block, then Tackle can work well, but of course can be wasted. If the player does not have Block, I like to consider Wrestle, which at least is never wasted. Of course there are situations when Block is better than Wrestle, but the reverse is also true.

Hope that helps.

Smeborg, it's a good point, though it thickens the conundrum for me to be honest.

Any Elf blitzer is a crucial piece and giving him tackle is basically akin to dropping a skill that is more universally useful (i.e. dodge or perhaps even side-step). So again, how important is it to simply bite the bullet and accept that you'll be "down a skill" against bashers but well-equipped against everyone else? Assuming the tourny is balanced between bash and agile, I'd be interested to see if coaches think it's worth the risk to lower anti-agile efficiency in the hope of combating your heavy-hitting foils.

Warpstone wrote:Smeborg, it's a good point, though it thickens the conundrum for me to be honest.

Any Elf blitzer is a crucial piece and giving him tackle is basically akin to dropping a skill that is more universally useful (i.e. dodge or perhaps even side-step). So again, how important is it to simply bite the bullet and accept that you'll be "down a skill" against bashers but well-equipped against everyone else? Assuming the tourny is balanced between bash and agile, I'd be interested to see if coaches think it's worth the risk to lower anti-agile efficiency in the hope of combating your heavy-hitting foils.

I tend to play elves in tournaments and rate tackle on one of the blitzers/wardancers with strip ball on the other. I'd not swap it out for a more anti bash skill as it's useful against so many good teams (undead, amazon, other elves, lizards).

Have you thought about Break Tackle? Might be worth a look! S.

I'm not really a tourney player but I believe smeborgs argument makes the most sense given your stated concerns. Any 2 die block with two acceptable results will work 55% of the time;80% with reroll. I'm assuming we are talking about a single critical block to take down the ball of course but the point is wrestle will never be wasted. It's probably fair to point out that frenzy is also a poor mans tackle; 4 dice needing a pow comes in at 52%, 2/3s with a reroll. Of course frenzy has other issues and you can't always get 2 dice on both blocks but it also has other values.

Playing High & Wood Elves I mostly take defensive skills, block, wrestle, dodge, etc, as I think if you still have most of the team at the end of the game you have probably won it, or at least not lost.

I would prefer strip ball on a wardancer before tackle as when he goes to get the ball it gives a better chance that the ball is freed than tackle. However I wouldnt have a problem taking tackle as a second skilll for its useful against most ball carriers, goblins, Zons, other catchers etc.

I wouldnt put tackle on a lineman as there are far better skills to take and use.

Thanks for the feedback everyone. In the end, I took strip ball + frenzy instead of tackle on my Wardancers.

I was happy with Frenzy. I don't doubt that Tackle would have been quite worth it against Amazons (yuck), but there were several tough bashers I faced (Chaos Dwarves, Orcs, Norse) that would have seen that skill pick wasted.