A Leg Up for Gobbos and Halflings

NightDragon · Post by **NightDragon** » Sun Sep 21, 2003 6:36 pm

A classic case of not all teams should be equal. The majority yes, as it is a board game for all to enjoy and compete fairly, but not those little squishers.

Joemanji · Post by **Joemanji** » Tue Sep 23, 2003 12:55 pm

I played with Gobbos in my league for a long time; maybe 2 years. I wanted a challenge, as before that I was winning every game quite comfortably. This may have had more to do with a lack of quality opponents than my own coaching ability!

But you can only beat what is put in front of you, as they say.

The point of the Stunty teams IMO, is for coaches to have a little bit of fun. That is what secret weapons, squigs, master chefs and the like are for. The current rules, which remove these elements, have also removed most of the fun.

I voted for the middle option. I would like to see the Stunty teams become a viable option for experienced coaches. At the moment they are a joke team who will lose a large number of their matches. I think that they should have a power level similar to that of Dwarfs in WFB. Capable of winning any match, but never likely to thrash anyone 4 or 5 nil.

Noone ever uses Dwarfs in the big WFB tournaments, because they are too slow to wipe the other army out, and so they never score the high VP wins. Stunty teams should be like this - always capable of pulling out a 1 - 0. Maybe not good enough to win the league themselves, but capable of having a say in who does.

Failing that though, just bring back the secret weapons so we can have a laugh!

I think the idea for stunty position players is genius! Having 0-4 "Blitzers" with exactly the same stats, but access to General skills, retains the useless nature of the teams, but allows for a lot more interest when it comes to team development. Great idea!

E.g.

0-16 Goblins 40K 6 2 3 7 Dodge, Stunty, RS (A)
0-4 Goblin Blitzers 40K 6 2 3 7 Dodge, Stunty, RS (A, G)
0-2 Goblin Throwers 40K 6 2 3 7 Dodge, Stunty, RS (A, P)

Chris · Post by **Chris** » Tue Sep 23, 2003 5:01 pm

Bifi wrote:I call for better halflings!

I think they are refered to as humans or dwarfs. If halflings are winning more than 1 game in 12 I think they are over powered, if they are worse, good.

NightDragon · Post by **NightDragon** » Tue Sep 23, 2003 8:43 pm

Nazgit, although I have an element of support with your views, I can categorically say they are not a joke team for experienced coaches, Galak has had a lot of success with halflings. I think they are fine at present and should not be made more competitive because they offer an element of fun as well as because they are too squishy to be equal.

Bifi · Post by **Bifi** » Wed Sep 24, 2003 7:19 am

Nazgit wrote:I think the idea for stunty position players is genius! Having 0-4 "Blitzers" with exactly the same stats, but access to General skills, retains the useless nature of the teams, but allows for a lot more interest when it comes to team development. Great idea!

Thanks pal!

Bifi · Post by **Bifi** » Wed Sep 24, 2003 7:21 am

NightDragon wrote:Nazgit, although I have an element of support with your views, I can categorically say they are not a joke team for experienced coaches, Galak has had a lot of success with halflings. I think they are fine at present and should not be made more competitive because they offer an element of fun as well as because they are too squishy to be equal.

Night Dragon, I would like to point out that not everyone is as good as Galak. And does "a lot of success" mean having more draws than losses?

Relborn · Post by **Relborn** » Wed Sep 24, 2003 7:25 am

I think the idea of positions is a good idea... but maybe limit them to one at start to see how this things work out. Like giving Gobbos and Halflings an adittional Catcher position (with catch and maybe an MV+1) ...

Post by **GalakStarscraper** » Thu Sep 25, 2003 1:45 am

Bifi wrote:Night Dragon, I would like to point out that not everyone is as good as Galak. And does "a lot of success" mean having more draws than losses?

No, "a lot of success" means that I'm 5 wins - 1 loss - 1 tie with TR 100 tournament team Halflings (ie Blood Bowl and Gen Con Bowl legal). I'm playing Flings in the Underworld Cup ... unfortunately rules don't allow Deeproot who was allowed in both of the above formats ... we'll see how I do there as well ... not having Deeproot will hurt, but I'll be curious to see how I do playing TR 100 without him.

As for leg up:

The new Master Chef the team will get in October will be a leg up for the team that is just fine. If On-pitch Take Root comes into play ... the team will still be competitive ... if it doesn't .... well the team will be a joke no matter what you think up.

As for Goblins ... been campaigning hard for the free weapon roll per a game for Goblins and allowing them up to 4 weapons and being to field them all on the pitch at once. Or if you use more of the Annual rules, allow the team up to 4 on the pitch at once with those rules.

These legs up are a lot better than adding positions to these teams in my opinion.

Galak

Bifi · Post by **Bifi** » Thu Sep 25, 2003 9:28 am

GalakStarscraper wrote:No, "a lot of success" means that I'm 5 wins - 1 loss - 1 tie with TR 100 tournament team Halflings (ie Blood Bowl and Gen Con Bowl legal). I'm playing Flings in the Underworld Cup ... unfortunately rules don't allow Deeproot who was allowed in both of the above formats ... we'll see how I do there as well ... not having Deeproot will hurt, but I'll be curious to see how I do playing TR 100 without him.
...
These legs up are a lot better than adding positions to these teams in my opinion.

Sorry Galak, I meant no disrespect, I haven't seen the results. I was speaking about the not-so-good and average coaches. Sure, stunties are in no way meant to be a team for a beginner. Maybe because of your experience you see things clearer.

plasmoid · Post by **plasmoid** » Thu Sep 25, 2003 10:44 am

Hi Bifi and all,

Bifi said:
>Now for the halflings:
>[snip]I would definitely not suggest to combine them with human layers.
>First of all, it's becoming an allied team then (instead of a halfling team),

The halflings only major settlement is in the middle of the Empire. They have a pretty close relationship with the imperial humans.
I guess it is a lot like:
Hobgoblins and chaos dwarfs on the same team.
Beastmen and chaos warriors.
and Goblins and Orcs.
That doesn't make it an allied team in my eyes.

>and, why the hell wouldn't other teams have players of different races on their rosters?
For the same reason that there aren't 8 mummies on the Khemri team, or 6 witch elfs on the dark elf team. The game-world rationale is probably that these players are rare, but the real reason is game balance.

Martin

plasmoid · Post by **plasmoid** » Thu Sep 25, 2003 10:48 am

Hi all,
In the past I've kicked around ideas about "position" goblins and halflings. In my experience, people didn't like this much, because the stats for goblins/halflings are defined in DZ. That is one of the reason that I added something else to the goblin/halfling rosters.

But IMO, position "stunties" could be a fun way to go

I think that 0-2 goblin catchers starting with catch skill would be a nice addition, without upsetting game balance.

I also think that passing skills on the halfling roster would be a neat thing. Unfortunately, the stunties -1 to pass does make a halfling thrower rather weak, but maybe that would be OK.

In my league, we had ann earlier version of the halfling team, with "Halfling Fatfellows".
0-4 Fatfellows 5336 dodge, stunty, stand firm. AG,ST.
They were a lot of fun!

Martin

Cool Hand Fluke · Post by **Cool Hand Fluke** » Thu Sep 25, 2003 11:31 am

Isn't the point of taking Gobbos/Flings either
# they're weak and difficult to play with (you know, a challenge)
# you're not expecting to win and play for laughs

Bifi · Post by **Bifi** » Fri Sep 26, 2003 6:58 am

plasmoid wrote:Hi Bifi and all,

Bifi said:
>Now for the halflings:
>[snip]I would definitely not suggest to combine them with human layers.
>First of all, it's becoming an allied team then (instead of a halfling team),

The halflings only major settlement is in the middle of the Empire. They have a pretty close relationship with the imperial humans.
I guess it is a lot like:
Hobgoblins and chaos dwarfs on the same team.
Beastmen and chaos warriors.
and Goblins and Orcs.
That doesn't make it an allied team in my eyes.

You're right about the rules, Plasmoid, but at least for me having human players in the halfling team would take away some fun... But I think your ideas for position players are cool, apart of the stand firm skill with fatfellows.

And if the halflings are on such friendly terms with nature (although the treemen are at least for me a reminiscence of The Lord of the Rings), why not give them dryads? There are the models in the Warhammer range, they could be something like 4329 (halfway to treemen) G, and maybe ST, Stand Firm or Thick Skull. Or they could be 6338 G, AG, Dodge (although now it resembles the human linemen concept).

But nonetheless, the halfling roster won't be changed this way in this year's BBRC and we will have plenty of time to test their rulings...

juck101 · Post by **juck101** » Fri Sep 26, 2003 8:53 pm

Anthony_TBBF said "You know, Gobbos aren't that bad a team in the right hands, I think they are capable of being competitive..." yes I think could be right. Never played them but they cant be all that bad. In the right hands I have seen a kick-ass halfling team in the basic 3rd ed rules when everyone had 4 star large monsters, and dirty player stopped teams dead They dont have much fig choice which means little but some indication they arn't a major force in BB.

Yet this debate I think should cross over with ogre teams in general. Ogres are way too powerful currently so why not just combine the two monster+stunty in a better mix. Ogre teams are either non-viable or amazing and the stunty boys can balance this out. Call it whatever team name you like but think they must live together

plasmoid · Post by **plasmoid** » Wed Oct 01, 2003 12:37 pm

Hi Bifi,
I actually quite like the thought of dryads on the halfling team.
(OK, I like imperial players better, but since everyone except me seem to be fine with the whole LotR Treemen & Halflings thing, then dryads could be a more acceptable way to go).

Still, for my personal tastes, I'd like to have these dryads add a little passing game, as well as ST3 players who can be relied on to carry the ball. This would give the halflings something that the other stunty teams don't have.
So I'd probably go:
0-2 "thrower dryads" 6338 thick skull, pass G,PA
0-2 "blitzer dryads" 6338 thick skull, block, G,ST

Martin

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