Newbie with Nurgle

Lictor · Post by **Lictor** » Thu Jun 18, 2009 5:00 am

Smeborg wrote:I am playing my 3rd league with Nurgle (44 games in total). I am still learning - Nurgle are a hard team to develop, as they take quite a lot of casualties, and SPPs tend to be distributed unevenly. Plus they gain SPPs at about half the rate of a "normal" team (the classic Nurgle victory is 1-0 with no Pass Completions and a low CAS count).

What does your team development look like?

Smeborg · Post by **Smeborg** » Thu Jun 18, 2009 6:17 am

BEAST: Break Tackle, Pro, +1ST

WARRIOR: M-Blow, Claw, Block
WARRIOR: M-Blow, Claw
WARRIOR: Guard
WARRIOR: -

PESTIGOR: Wrestle, +1AG
PESTIGOR: Wrestle
PESTIGOR: Extra Arms
PESTIGOR: -

ROTTER: Block, +1AV
ROTTER: Block
ROTTER: Block
ROTTER: -
ROTTER: -
ROTTER: -
ROTTER: -

3 Re-rolls, 10 FF (was 13...), 1 AC, 1 CL

The team suffered a big blow recently when their star Pestigor Horny died (Sure Hands, Extra Arms, +1MA, Sure Feet, 61 SPPs). They struggle a bit now to move the ball.

I think I have got the plan right for the Beast (aggressively mobile Tentacles), for the Pestigors (2 ball handlers, 2 blitzers) and for the Rotters (all linemen). But the Warriors pose a development problem, I think. I have gone for 2 slayers because we have an Orc-heavy league. And Nurgle need some slayer abilities otherwise they get mashed by bash teams. They also need the ability to put opponents off the pitch in order to improve their weak offense. I originally planned to have 4 slayers, but I feel the lack of Guard on the team.

If I play Nurgle again in a league, I might be tempted to go the super-Nurgly route by giving Block, Stand Firm, Tentacles to the Warriors. But without M-Blow, they would take an age to develop, and would still get mashed by bash teams, especially those with Claw. I think the most popular first skill on Warriors (from my reading on the forums) is Block. Block is very good on them in tournaments.

I would like to have Kick and Kick-Off Return on the team, but this seems quite a luxury at low levels of experience. Perhaps one Pestigor with Sure Hands, Extra Arms, KoR, and another with Sure Hands, Extra Arms, Kick would work well (that's the plan now, anyway).

The team has played 23 games. In this time they have lost 4 Warriors, 1 Pestigor and 5 Rotters to deaths and retirements. This is light - in a previous long league I copped double this damage.

Hope this helps.

Lictor · Post by **Lictor** » Thu Jun 18, 2009 6:49 am

Smeborg wrote: The team has played 23 games. In this time they have lost 4 Warriors, 1 Pestigor and 5 Rotters to deaths and retirements. This is light - in a previous long league I copped double this damage.Hope this helps.

HOLY CRAP!!!

I was annoyed to have 3 linemen die in a single league.

4 St 4 guys... I think I would of shed a tear going to sleep lol.

Nuffle doesn't bless me with fantasticness, he has an odd sense of humour about who dies in my teams but generally speaking my teams are awesome due to lack of long term damage.

7 deaths on my W'Elf team over 23ish games, 5 were Wardancers.
4 Deaths on my Human team in 10 Games, 3 were Linemen who got the Wrestle skill in the game previous.
But with 4 other long term teams I have had no deaths and only 1 Niggling Injury.

Smeborg · Post by **Smeborg** » Thu Jun 18, 2009 12:16 pm

Nurgle take a lot of punishment, because they have no starting Block, and no ability to dodge away from trouble. AV8 and no Block is easy to injure.

Another way of looking at it is to consider that Nurgle are like Orcs (very similar stat lines) except that Nurgle have no Block and most of their team is at -1AV. And they cost more...

In my first long league with Nurgle, I lost (from memory) 22 players in 24 games. Most of these were Rotters, of course, but there were plenty of positional players in there too.

A side like (say) Pro Elves or Wood Elves will take far fewer Casualties, because they can avoid being blocked (AG4 + Dodge, Sidestep etc.).

I find that Chaos take a lot of punishment too (whether played by me or others).

Cheers

Carnis · Post by **Carnis** » Thu Jun 18, 2009 12:44 pm

I'd avoid wrestling pestigors tbh. Why not just build the team for killing with just 1 ballhandler. There's 2 edges they get over plain orcs

1. Is horns (no assist for pesti blitzes),
2. The other is claw access. Use them!

For these they pay heavily in AV & block.

1x Beast (BLOCK!, not pro, stand firm/multiblock/guard other choises)
4x Block/MB/Claw Wars. (just like chaos, fearsome when ready)
1x "Blitzer" pesti: mb/piling/claw/block route (tackle/frenzy - doubles: jump up) - Blitz every turn for effective S4.
1x "Runner" pesti: Block/Surehands/Kick-off-Return,X-arms
2x Blockers: Guard, Block, MB
Linoes: DP, followed by block followed by DP as the other one is bound to die or get sent off.. Guard on doubles.. Block Fend is nice, but doubt you can get rank2 rotters..

The other obvious choise is go 4x block on the pestigors, and pray for a st or ag increase & build on from there. If you specialize early (Guard or mb or sure hands as first skill), you may end up using stat incs less than optimally.

Otake · Post by **Otake** » Thu Jun 18, 2009 5:30 pm

Hi.

I've been playing Nurgle for 10 matches in a short-term league.

Your choices are depending on your league.

Here from my experience :
- Extra-Arms helps you a lot to get a grip on the ball, but then it's true, you always score with that same guy. It's why I've put Extra-Arms on a second Pestigor. Now I can score with this one, have a replacement if one dies, and can use the other like a catcher.

- Wrestle on Pestigor : your Pestigors do 90 % of my ball handling and TD scoring. Losing one on the pitch is a great handicap. If you play LRB5+, don't let such valuable players lying down on the pitch. If your opponents are like me, your Pestigors are going to be decorated with boot prints.
And Horns gives you a boost to sack the ball carrier, so I think Wrestle is not a good choice on a Pestigor. I once made a test match with 2 full Nurgle teams, one with 4 Block Pestigors and the other one with 4 Wrestle Pestigors. The advantage was for the blocking ones (but you can't judge completely in one match)

- Block on NW : mandatory. As for other skills, it depends if your opponents are forced to play against your team or not. Even with no additional MB, I've never played "Charity games" with my team. Too violent. ^ ^

- Rotters, which skills ? I don't know, not any of them has managed to get a skill in 10 matches !

Of course Dirty Player will be my first choice on the first two who graduate (one for replacement), but then Block will be my choice. One with Tackle perhaps ?
I also agree that Rotters are one of the best 0-16 positional. they're cheap, so you have plenty of them and you don't cry when they're out of the pitch. So each time you are in numerical superiority, FOUL with at least 2 or 3 assists.

- Leader on a Rotter : when your team is full with 4 Pestigors, 4 NWs, 1 NB (our league is richly doted), you only have 3 Rotters on a defensive line-up. Personally I put all 3 of them on the LOS, with my NB just behind (so this delicate, subtle and nice creature is not bullied by opposing mean Big Guys). So Leader would not be useful.
I would put Sneaky Git with a double, but it's personal taste.

- First skill on the NB (if no double) : I would put Guard, but it's because I seldom use my Big Guys offensively. I like to use them as annoying guard towers. And as the NB has tentacles, it perfectly fills that role. Put it in the midst of your ST3 opponents, and Block everything that moves around with your other players.

Apart from that point, I agree with all was said.

Grumbledook · Post by **Grumbledook** » Thu Jun 18, 2009 6:16 pm

Otake wrote:- Wrestle on Pestigor : your Pestigors do 90 % of my ball handling and TD scoring. Losing one on the pitch is a great handicap. If you play LRB5+, don't let such valuable players lying down on the pitch. If your opponents are like me, your Pestigors are going to be decorated with boot prints.
And Horns gives you a boost to sack the ball carrier, so I think Wrestle is not a good choice on a Pestigor. I once made a test match with 2 full Nurgle teams, one with 4 Block Pestigors and the other one with 4 Wrestle Pestigors. The advantage was for the blocking ones (but you can't judge completely in one match)

That is why I recommend 2 with wrestle and 2 with block

Smeborg · Post by **Smeborg** » Thu Jun 18, 2009 10:41 pm

Well, I am a firm advocate of Wrestle on Pestigors. It does very well for me in leagues, and I am starting to have excellent results in tournaments with this system (tournament house rules permitting). My best result to date was 4th place out of 72 coaches at CanCon (Australian national tournament) in January, beaten only by the tournament winner (slayer Dwarf team). I had a good dose of luck, naturally, to get that far. More recently, I came second in a small tournament in Napier (NZ) - 10 coaches - again beaten only by the tournament winner (slayer Dwarfs again...).

The reason I advocate Wrestle on Pestigors (followed by Fend for protection and mobility, then Tackle) is because, while the Nurgle defense is OK, you still need to sack the opponent's ball carrier at some point. There is no better single skill than Wrestle for this purpose. Ball carriers often have Block, and even with Horns, the Blitz is often at 1 die, due to assists (or the ball carrier being ST4). I recall a memorable victory I had over Amazons in a tournament last year - from memory I sacked the ball carrier 4 times thanks to Wrestle on Pestigors.

I much prefer Block on Rotters to Wrestle, as it fits their role (markers, escorts, screeners, utility). Their hindrance value is greater if they can remain standing.

I agree that, other things being equal, the best first skill on Warriors is Block. Things were not equal when our league started, with 4 Orcs and 1 Dwarf team (out of 15), so I went the M-Blow/Claw route.

The debate on Pro vs. Block on the Beast has been debated more than once before on this thread. I am open-minded and understand the point of view of coaches who prefer Block. I prefer Pro as it suits my preferred style of play for the Beast (agrressively mobile, not a blocker). The worst thing that can happen to the Beast is to lose his tackle zone - Pro is the best help you can have to avoid that. Pro also means that in a critical (game-breaking) situation, the Beast potentially has 2 Re-rolls (Pro plus team Re-roll), allowing him, for example, to dodge, go for it, sack the ball carrier etc..

I am not sure there is a definitive development route for such a strange side as Nurgle, especially since they start with so few skills. They are not a completely blank canvas (like, say, Chaos), but they can take several routes, I think. It is not easy to develop them so that they can compete against all the different races. On the other hand, it seems quite easy to develop them so that they will cream some races, and get mashed in turn by others. That sort of route does not appeal to me - I would like to see them compete against all comers.

All the best.

Otake · Post by **Otake** » Fri Jun 19, 2009 8:51 am

Clear and well Argued. I will try it.

Mr_lemon · Post by **Mr_lemon** » Thu Jun 25, 2009 8:21 pm

Three matches played now and thus far three victories (Goblins 2-1, Necromantic 1-0 and Wood Elf 2-1) but not that many SPP's. Good Winnings and no permanent damage to players has made me reach 13 players (just waiting for the rotters to start dying

) which is developed as following:

Beast of Nurgle (2spp)
Nurgle Warrior (3spp)
Nurgle Warrior (0spp)
Nurgle Warrior (5spp)
Nurgle Warrior (0spp)
Pestigor BLOCK (12spp)
Pestigor ROLLED DOUBLE (7spp)
Pestigor (0spp)
Rotter LEADER (6spp)
Rotter (0spp)
Rotter (0spp)
Rotter (2spp)
Rotter (0spp)

So what would you take on the double for the pestigor?

Grumbledook · Post by **Grumbledook** » Thu Jun 25, 2009 8:31 pm

sidestep

dodge is useful but you won't have much on your team so it will be easy for the other team to target him

if you don't take any dodge at all it makes any team with tackle have bloated TV against you

Smeborg · Post by **Smeborg** » Thu Jun 25, 2009 8:34 pm

Under my current system (which I suspect may be different to yours) I give doubles to the Pestigors as follows:

- For the 2 ball handling Pestigors: first double Sure Feet, second double Sprint.

- For the 2 blitzing Pestigors: first double Sidestep, second double Jump Up.

Hope this helps.

Mr_lemon · Post by **Mr_lemon** » Mon Jul 20, 2009 3:50 pm

A few more matches played, my current gamerecord is 6 Wins 1 Draw 0 Losses. I've been rolling double or stat-increases on almost all of my improvements (which is actually annoying as you usually wants to pick block or some regular skills in the beginning.

My team now looks like:
Beast of Nurgle (2spp)
Nurgle Warrior (8spp) Block (Choose it instead of a double)
Nurgle Warrior (0spp)
Nurgle Warrior (8spp) Block (Took it on a roll of 6+4)
Nurgle Warrior (0spp)
Pestigor Block, AG+1 (23spp)
Pestigor SIDESTEP (11spp)
Pestigor MA+1 DOUBLE (16spp)
Rotter LEADER (6spp)
Rotter Kick(7spp)
Rotter (0spp)
Rotter Dirty Player(8spp)

So did I make the right decisions and what do I take on the double on the MA+1 Pestigor?

Carnis · Post by **Carnis** » Mon Jul 20, 2009 6:52 pm

I would take dodge, and make him a ballcarrier (MA fits this). This way at least your opponent will be down to just a few players who can blitz your ballcarrier (the tacklers). Get Block/Surehands next, if you still have him alive and kicking either twoheads for dodgin out of (or into, on defence) trouble or extra arms for grabbing the ball off sticky places (or both, or if you are lucky just get +AG which is more expensive, but does both!)..

I'm amazed you can hold a 7 game lossless streak with a starting tabula rasa team like nurgle.

Mr_lemon · Post by **Mr_lemon** » Mon Jul 20, 2009 7:14 pm

Yeah Dodge was my initial reaction (and maybe I should have taken it on the other Pestigor instead of Sidestep too?) but for a while I was thinking about Catch or Diving Catch to make him a receiver and my AG+1 Pestigor a thrower with Strong Arm or Sure hands as next improvement except on a double, but since I'm new to Nurgle maybe that's the wrong way to go.

I guess I've been lucky getting this streak. Been playing against Necros 3 times, Goblins 2 times, Slann 1 time and Wood Elves 1 time. Against Slann, Goblin and Wood Elves the Beast tentacles has worked well and all that disturbing presence has really killed the passing game for the opposition. Let's see how long the streak lasts...