Damn ballsy or damn stupid?

[DaFoola]

Inspired by Zombie's berating the ability of the Chaos Pact team to get 5 players with ST4+, as well as subsequent responses, I decided to create an orc team with 5 players at ST4+, and see if I could make it playable.

Well, now I am pondering using this orc team in place of my normal, more pedestrian greenskin lineup in the MBBL, and I would be interested to get the input of other coaches (though i realize that other MBBL coaches may have conflicting interests regarding a response) as to whether this team is a viable candidate for league play or just another example of greenskin "frontloading".

Here's the vitals:
1 Troll, 4 Black Orcs, 2 Blitzers, 1 Thrower, 1 Goblin, 2 Lineorcs, 3rr, 3ff.
yeah, I know the fan factor is low, and exchanging a trr for 6ff is a possibility.

So what do you think?

[Zombie]

I never had any problem with the ST4 players on the Chaos Pact team. It's the elves, the gutter runner and the big guys i have a problem with, and also the fact that the team is too good at everything.

[Mestari]

Zombie - maybe you should allow them in your league, trash everyone with it so you get proof behind your opinion on the subject. The fact that they made experimental status means that the guys have thought over it and come to the conclusion that they're not overpowered and won't be convinced by talking alone. Personally I feel that the income problems will keep the team in check despite the potential they have.

My Chaos Pact team, Malleus Benefacorum, just won their first game against rookie amazons 2-1. Would've made 3-1 had the skaven runner caught an accurate pass in the EZ on the last turn of the first half.
My starting lineup doesn't seem too good, but not too weak either. And the gutter runner was an excellent choice. With his movement he fulfills his role perfectly - whether it be acting as a decoy or running to the EZ. Now I'm waiting to get an apothecary... rolled '1' for income after the game...

[GalakStarscraper]

Mestari,

Zombie doesn't believe in testing things he knows are broken.

Footnote on this one ... the MBBL has been requested to test the Chaos Pact team with only 0-2 Beastmen as the secondary lineman slot and no access to Dark Elf players. So the folks are listening even though you don't think so. Last time I checked sheep don't listen that well.

Galak

[Pink Horror]

Amazing. Usually I'm one of the first going off track, but it looks like I'm going to make the first on-topic reply.

DaFoola, go ahead with your lineup. Don't listen to the fan factor horders out there - it's not as important as they make it seem. You will develop more slowly, and you might get torn up by a few bad kickoff results, but you'll also have more power for your TR (versus a team with 9 FF and equal TR, you'll have 6 more TR points worth of players). Don't forget how helpful the handicap table can be. When your team of 11 elite players hits the field against a team that spent its extra money on benchwarmers, and you score a good handicap result, you'll be off to an easy start.

I'd even start with 2 rerolls if I were you. I like to think of buying rerolls as getting back 6 TR points, because if you buy a re-roll and an equal team buys 120k of players, you'll be 6 TR points behind. An MBBL team, unless you're extremely patient, should be designed to sacrifice long term effectiveness for a short term advantage. Let's face it, you'll have to wait a year before any early frugalness will benefit you. Maybe you should even start with money in the bank for a first round star player. Pull out all the tricks you can.

You team could use some improvement. What's the goblin for? Do you need 3 re-rolls? With a big guy and 4 black orcs, your team is set now to be at its best during your opponent's turn. You know that's when strength helps the most, right? During your turn, you're going to want as many players with skills as possible. Assists are usually easy to get, so strength isn't as important.

It looks like your touchdowns will come from thrower keepers, but the three re-rolls allow for safe passes to blitzers as a second option. With only two blitzers, do you have enough to open holes and receive passes? Starting with 3 might be better.

Who's going to pick up the ball on kickoffs? Only one thrower could have a hard time securing the ball, but you'll feel compelled to use him. Are you willing to pick up with a lineman and hand off to the thrower? Figure out what your backfield will look like. I wouldn't take only one thrower if I were to insist collecting the ball with him. That's giving yourself too many tough decisions to make. With only one likely receiver, Pass won't get much of a workout, so I say either get a second thrower, ditch the thrower for something else, or get more receivers.

If I were you, I'd choose a focused plan and stick to it. It looks like your plan is the strength game. That means the goblin and thrower don't belong. They're weak links anyway. Play like you're chaos and use more linemen. That would be interesting.

Even more interesting is this lineup (if the MBBL uses star players): 4 Black Orcs, 5 Linemen, 2 Goblins, 3 RRs, 2 FF, and 150k. That gives you two games with Ripper Bolgrot. If you can get 75k over the first 2 games (possible with average dice and 1 win) you have Ripper for the third, and your TR should be lower than almost everyone else's. Don't forget that Ripper can use re-rolls. This is the sort of oddball thing that Galak's test league should be testing. If everyone keeps playing by conventional wisdom the league isn't as valuable a source of test data as it could be.



Pink Horror

[GalakStarscraper]

I encourage players to break/bend/mangle the rules as best as possible. I have 40 coaches now in the MBBL from about 15 different countries. I'm trusting that at least a couple souls are trying to bust the rules to their advantage.

Galak

[Pink Horror]

That's good to hear. Do you know of anyone who's going to go with an unorthodox strategy this season?



Pink Horror

[DaFoola]

You team could use some improvement. What's the goblin for? Do you need 3 re-rolls? With a big guy and 4 black orcs, your team is set now to be at its best during your opponent's turn. You know that's when strength helps the most, right?

agreed. I was just looking at the team the other night and thought, "What the hell is the gobbo for?" My first thought was either to be thrown or thrown to. After all, I created the team initially as more of a novelty than anything else (look, I can have five ST4+ players. whee)

It looks like your touchdowns will come from thrower keepers, but the three re-rolls allow for safe passes to blitzers as a second option. With only two blitzers, do you have enough to open holes and receive passes? Starting with 3 might be better.

True. When playing with orcs, I always like to have the short, safe pass as an option, and I feel that blitzers often make their own holes. However, I like this "play like you're chaos" option. Maybe I'll drop one of the rerolls in favor of turning the goblin into a lineorc, the thrower into another blitzer, and putting the rest into FF.

The Ripper Bolgrot idea is definitely rather interesting, though I'm not as likely to take that particular bit of advice.

[Dangerous Dave]

PH - freebooting Ripper is an interesting tactic... but although Ripper is a good player he is limited.... no Block. If I was playing against him I'd just put a sacrificial lamb next to him - if the lino had dodge great. You could also tie up the 4 Black Orcs then it would be Orc linos and Gobbos v your position players. Sure when the Orcs receive your LOS is likely to get bashed a bit.... but you would be unlucky to lose all the players on the line (remember no Block on the Orc team at all).

With no apothecary, those gobbos will be very vulnerable and you could lose some linos too. So in game 3 you may have enough money to freeboot Ripper again.... but you could be down to 4 BOBs 1 (or none!) Gobbo and 4 Linos (or worse).

Also in the later games (games 3 to 5) - sure you are likely to have the lowest TR. However, then you are hoping for good rolls on the Handicap Table. If you don't get good rolls (eg +1 to FF) then you will struggle. Assuming all players survive after game 3, what will you do in game 4? - you will have no cash, no apoth and 4 BOBs, 5 Linos and 2 Gobbos (remember to advance to the play offs you will almost certainly need a minimum record of 4-1).

An interesting strategy but I suspect that it is doomed to failure - the team may well win the first couple of games... after that IMO the odds are against it.



Dave

[GalakStarscraper]

That's good to hear. Do you know of anyone who's going to go with an unorthodox strategy this season?
Pink Horror

Balrog won Season 1 of the MBBL with a starting Chaos roster of all Beastman and 4 Rerolls which was very different.

It takes a while for folks to think out of the box. The 1st season of the MBBL was the first time I had ever freebooted players ... now I freeboot 2 Halflings every game for the LOS and to put TZs on players.

Its happening PH .... and yes this coming Season I think the rule breakers have points to prove with the 5 new experimental teams and kicking rules ... I'm interested to see what happens since I know folks that hate the rules are designing rosters to prove that these new rules don't work.

Galak

[Joshua Dyal]

I did an orc team not too distant from that, although it was for a short term undertaking, not a permanent league.

3 BOs
3 Blitzers
1 Thrower
2 Linos
2 Gobbos
1 Ogre
2 Rerolls
3 FF

Did fairly well with them so far. But the low FF is probably not something I'd do for a league, depending on the length of the league. For a truly permanent league, I wouldn't worry too much about FF and let it grow. I'm used to playing in "season" leagues where you reset after every season, though. Since each season only lasts 3-4 months, and you normally play one game a week, the FF was really important to get you money to advance your team quickly. Too low FF and you never got to get your "real" lineup bought before the season ended.

For your purposes, I suppose I could downgrade the ogre to a troll, use the 20k to upgrade another Lino to a BO and pump another 10k into FF as well.

Sure, may not be a great lineup for league play, but it's certainly viable, I think. You may not win, but you probably won't be embarrassed by them, at least.

EDIT: Bad math. Updgrade to Lino to BO and lose a point of FF, not gain one.