Apothecary healing Crowd casualties...

[fen]

stars seem to be either very good, or horrible

This is the major part of Inducements I'm still not happy with. The additional stars will help in bringing things back up towards a balance for those teams who have less than 6. It doesn't help those teams who already have cruddy stars who duplicate abilities of other stars, or are just redundant for the team.

To list a few of the more rubbish stars. Grashnak, Headsplitter, Hakflem (who's better, but still not that great) and Bomber...

Then there are the stars that aren't very good but you have no choice in the matter - Ripper is a prime example, he's very bleah for Goblins (improving him is out of the question because he's on the Orc, Chaos and Nurgle rosters - where he can be comboed with Varag or Borak). But the Goblin team is screwed thanks in part to his increased price and also by having 4 Secret Weapon stars AND Morg eating up the rest of the Star Player slots. It's a mess to play, but if Morg, Ripper (or a SW) could be replaced with Brick and Grotty then things would be fine there.

Then there are the stars that are just plain great for their cost - Borak, Skitter, Jordell, Varag, Hemlock, Nobbla, Scrappa, Moranion, Eldril, Hthark, Icepelt (ever played against two MB snow trolls? ), Flint (Block... wth?), Zug and Slibli (like Lizardmen need a Guard star ) Not all of these I think are out of whack, but you do have to conceed the sheer power and focus this lot have.

To stay remotely on topic, I always thought the apoth not working on crowd pushes was cheap and pretty pointless anyway. With the nerfing of the apoth I think it's a reasonable switch as regen works on crowd pushes. Anything which takes ammunition away from the "regen is too good" whiney babies is fine by me.

[Snew]

Star player are and always have been a band aid for poor planning and now that they're so deeply ingrained into the rules were screwed. We'll never get rid of them or get them ironed out just because of the points you made.

What we need is another sort of inducement that will make playing without stars truely optional. Right now it's not an option to eliminate them even though the rules say you can.

[GalakStarscraper]

What we need is another sort of inducement that will make playing without stars truely optional. Right now it's not an option to eliminate them even though the rules say you can.

I don't agree. I plan to run the MBBL2 without Stars as an inducement ... so I don't see why they are not optional.

Galak

[voyagers_uk]

all the way back into the mists of my youth, we broke our league of using Star players by killing them all regularly.

I once managed to kill Griff, Zug and Morg all in one half

home grown was always the way for me, unless I had too much cash and wanted to waste it.

Under Lrb5.0 I would pick a star if given the choice, which I think is what Snew means..... given a choice who wouldn't play a broken player or two against an overdog.

keep us posted Tom

[Xeterog]

stars seem to be either very good, or horrible

This is the major part of Inducements I'm still not happy with.

I wasn't exactly clear here..sorry.

I was refering more to stars having a seemingly random effect on a particular game.

For example, I sometimes take a chainsaw star. Almost every time, he gets KO'd or hurt on the 1st turn. But then, I've played against a chainsaw that never got knocked down and caused alot of havok. Same player, but his effectiveness still varies wildly.

If Morg gets taken out by a rock on the opening kickoff, you probably aren't getting much value out of him...

I don't really mind if there are 'sub par' stars or not--gives more variety, at least in the list

[fen]

Gotchta Gortex.

I don't really mind if there are 'sub par' stars or not--gives more variety, at least in the list

But you have noticed how the sub par stars tend to gravitate to certain teams more than others right? Orcs for example have a superb set of stars, other teams well, it can vary a lot but Skaven and Elves tend to have the short end of the stick (maybe they deserve it )

Mostly I think my agenda is about Brick and Grotty, who I really want to be able to use with my goblin circus team.

[Darkson]

Stars should have stayed in the fluff.

[Warpstone]

But you have noticed how the sub par stars tend to gravitate to certain teams more than others right?

I've always noticed that too. I figure that with 6 stars per roster, each race should have atleast 1 unique outright superstar (Deeproot, Ramtut, etc). I don't see that anymore for a lot of teams where Big Guys were incorporated into the roster (i.e. Skaven now that Headsplitter doesn't give you much more than a ROgre).

[Snew]

Stars should have stayed in the fluff.

You're right of course. Unfortunately fluff spawns rules in our sad little world.

[Warpstone]

Stars should have stayed in the fluff.

You're right of course. Unfortunately fluff spawns rules in our sad little world.

If fluff wasn't so important, we'd all be playing a game with as much spirit and character as GURPS.

[Darkson]

Depends - fluff can be ignored when it suits (Chaos Pact team), yet other times it's the be all and end all.

I honestly preferred the LRB 1-4 version of star usage, where they (normally) only turned up once in a blue moon, because of the cost, not every game on any old team.

[zephard]

I honestly preferred the LRB 1-4 version of star usage, where they (normally) only turned up once in a blue moon, because of the cost, not every game on any old team.

Don't you mean "new" team?

Gortex, I know what you mean, I just wanting to get some play time with the new LRB 5 rules, had a new team play the only team available at the moment in the league I am in, well I was able to get Morg n' Thorg. Turn 2 of my oppenent who recieved, Badly Hurt him, and out of the game he went. I only had wandering APO so no healling him. Lot of Inducement taken out quite early.

[PubBowler]

I only had wandering APO so no healling him.

I had understood that Starplayers can't use rostered or induced apoths or Igors. Am I mistaken?

[Xeterog]

not anymore. During playtesting, they could be, but it was determined that this was a bit to much.

[Tritex]

See aside the new Apoth working for Crowd push which I agree is good for the game and still a risky prospect as the apoth can actually do more damage now!

I actually agree in the last leage we have seen casualty rate increased by 50%. Not just skill related but in the main because of fouling which is running amok.

On star players, I agree with Fen ref the assessment of some being next to useless and others being too cheap or too expensive but to incorportae them in our league we use the foillowing house rule:

Cost for the players is as listed + Higher Price however Star takes 3000 off winnings for every SPP gained during the match played as commision (This does not apply to induced star players) Star Players do not gain further SPP's - they are too good!!
Only official star players as listed in Vault rules LRB 5 will be allowed. At the end of the match team with star player myst roll a D6 on a roll of a 1 that player leaves the team (no re-rolls)
If the Star is on the losing side a roll of a 1 or 2 on a D6 will mean he will leave the side! If two teams field the same star player for a match the Star refuses to play for both sides
Hiring stars is a fickle & risky strategy but can be rewarding, they are all 'Divas' at heart - remember this well!

It keeps teams with stars in check but at least has the option! Incedentily Nobbla is used a lot and he is too cheap in my opinion!