Pact team rosters (mixed race), only used against each other

Phreedh · Post by **Phreedh** » Fri Feb 11, 2005 12:19 pm

Ok, so me and some of my mates started out with 2nd edition and we've really missed the mixed race mayhem since we transfered to 3rd edition. A while ago I took a look at the pact team rosters on fumbbl.com and found them quite unbalanced inbetween. We changed them around a little and the current rosters work quite well. We mostly play one-off games now and then, and these rosters are only used versus other pact teams. There's a lot of incoherency with the fluff though... I'll get to that later... first, the rosters:

Code: Select all

Core players Chaos Pact          Core players Old World Pact
  0-1  Minotaur                    0-1  Ogre
  0-1  Troll                       0-1  Treeman
  0-2  Beastman                    0-2  Dwarf Longbeard
  0-12 Chaos Marauder              0-12 Human Lineman
Chaos                            Dwarf
  0-1  Warrior                     0-1  Troll Slayer
  0-2  Beastmen                    0-1  Blitzer
Chaos Dwarf                        0-1  Runner
  0-1  Bull Centaur                0-2  Longbeard
  0-1  Chaos Dwarf Blocker       Elf
  0-2  Hobgoblin                   0-1  Blitzer
Dark Elf                           0-1  Catcher
  0-1  Witch Elf                   0-1  Thrower
  0-1  Blitzer                     0-2  Lineman
  0-1  Thrower                   Halfling
  0-2  Lineman                     0-2  Halfling
Goblin                           Human
  0-2  Goblin                      0-1  Blitzer
Orc                                0-1  Thrower
  0-1  Black Orc Blocker           0-1  Catcher
  0-1  Blitzer                     0-2  Lineman
  0-1  Thrower                   Norse
  0-1  Goblin                      0-1  Blitzer
  0-2  Lineman                     0-1  Thrower
Skaven                             0-1  Catcher
  0-1  Storm vermin                0-2  Lineman
  0-1  Gutter runner             Wood Elf
  0-1  Thrower                     0-1  Wardancer
  0-2  Lineman                     0-1  Thrower
                                   0-1  Catcher
                                   0-2  Lineman
Allowances go: Any players from core (yes, two big guys possible) and then either ONE positional or up to TWO linemen from each race. No more. So either a Storm Vermin OR two Skaven Linemen. All stats and costs are per the rule books, except Chaos Marauders - they're Norse Linemen with another name.

I wanted the two sides to be as similar as possible as far as options go... it is near on impossible to achieve though. I know there are a few fluff like problems, but that's no big deal for me... Like, why no rat ogres? To keep the big guy balance. Why ogre on chaos pact? To keep the big guy balance. Why norse on old world? I've never seen them as a chaotic aligned race. I've always figured them to be more kind of "it's grim up north" humans, who can go either way. I actually wanted to have Chaos Humans too at first, but I also wanted orcs. Would've been hard to counter part the two sides then. The matching goes a little something like this:
Chaos dwarf - Dwarf
Dark elf - Elf
Goblins - Halflings
Orcs - Humans
Skaven - Wood elves
Chaos - Norse

Old world is slightly more agile and ball oriented but can hold it's own in a punching contest too. None of the guys I play with are "maxers" so to speak. They rather put together a fun team than an effective team. My cousin bought linemen from the dwarf list, instead of a slayr or a blitzer, for instance. Most popular picks will ofcourse be blitzers but that doesn't matter much, does it? Sometimes people have picked gutter runners, sometimes they've picked storm vermins. I don't think anyone will get hobgoblins or skaven linemen though. =) At most, you get a team with five positionals, two big guys and the rest stunties/linos. That's pretty much like any team - except for the big guys. Since the same applies to all opponents, it's no big deal (LOL ROFL OMG ASL FBI BBQ a pun!)

Oh, the rerolls differ in cost btw... I have no idea why... it's a remnant from the original fumbbl rosters. 90K for Chaos and 80K for Old World. OW has weaker armour and will have to replace more players so it's only fair they're a little cheaper. Maybe they should diff more?

I've played around with making an undead faction too, containing variants on undead (khemri, necro, undead) and also rotters (putrid festering things... I know they're chaos, but they're borderline undead

). With the introduction of vampire teams as an official team it might work. They were too weak on the ball handling front before.

Any opinions? Ideas on how to make them even more balanced inbetween?

BTW, the way we're playing this is a bit like one off games. My cousin and I play over the net often, with the javabowl client. I have all the minis... dedicated pact minis, using mainly second edition minis. Painting them up so I have two old world sets and two chaos pact sets. One red and one blue version. I'm starting out with the popular choices so I probably never will paint any orc linemen for instance. Pics of my first two old world red team minis can be found here:
viewtopic.php?t=15075

/Phreedh

Odium Khan · Post by **Odium Khan** » Sun Feb 13, 2005 10:09 pm

I always thought the pact teams need the dislike and animosity rules back! Something like Dislike -won't lend assists; Animosity -need 4+ on a d6 to hand off or pass. It will become a challenge to remember all the players' dislikes and animosities but it would be fun overall and add to the fluff I think.

Phreedh · Post by **Phreedh** » Mon Feb 14, 2005 2:24 pm

Yeah, that's especially true if you're goint to mix them with regular teams - however we keep pact teams separated from regular teams so animosities and dislikes would just add some friction to the game system. It wouldn't be a tool for balancing a team versus others, since it would affect both teams. Especially when counting assists it'd be a pain.

I'm trying to keep it to purely rosters with no additional rules.

cornixt · Post by **cornixt** » Wed Feb 16, 2005 12:14 pm

I'm not sure if I missed something, but isn't this almost exactly the same as the other Pact rules? A Core of players, then 0-1 positional players or 0-2 linemen. The only difference I can see is that you can have several from each allied team, and a few more teams to ally with.

Phreedh · Post by **Phreedh** » Wed Feb 16, 2005 2:15 pm

cornixt wrote:I'm not sure if I missed something, but isn't this almost exactly the same as the other Pact rules?

Yeah, you did miss something... the part where I said they're tweaked rosters, tweaked with the purpose to be balanced and fun versus each other but not versus other rosters.

Actually, the point of this post wasn't to "push a new idea" or anything. I just wanted you lot to take a gander at the rosters we're using and say if there's anything you think is totally wrong and in the long run would break the balance. I'm not saying "here, play this cause it's the best way to play mixed race teams".