Inducements & Coaching Staff -- WDYT?

[mattgslater]

House rules for cards, card-oriented coaching staff, and inducements.

I'm looking to introduce a new card deck that incorporates some (but not all) of the elements taken out of or toned down in the cards after 3rd edition, such as instant TD-stoppers, permanent bad stuff, and money. I'm also looking to tone down the value of inducements for a fixed-schedule league, without eliminating them entirely. The main question with this post is: does this set of rules sound like fun?

Coaching Staff
There are 4 new coaching staff members: the Manager, the Wizard, the Alchemist and the Mascot. I'm not sure how to cost them, but I was thinking somewhere in the 30k-50k range. They allow you to take cards from decks not normally available (but they don't give you extra cards).

Inducements
When you calculate TV difference, divide it by two, rounding down to the nearest 10k, to determine the inducement cash. This will help balance the (now somewhat higher) cost of induced players and give an advantage to teams spending hard-earned petty cash.

You may do the following with inducement cash:
A) Hire mercenaries or coaching staff available to your team (you must have space on your roster at that position) for the player or staff member's listed value. You may buy a single standard skill increase on any given mercenary for 20k.
B) Draw a card. You get one card for free; additional cards are 50k each. You may draw only one card from any given deck; after you have drawn your cards, you may discard a single card and draw another from the same deck. There are 4 standard decks of 26 cards each, and 4 special decks of 13 cards each.

Cards
The four standard decks are each 26 cards, and the four special decks are each 13 cards. Anyone may draw from any of the standard decks, but it takes special coaching staff to draw from the special decks. Only one card may be drawn from any given deck, but you may after drawing all your cards discard a single card and draw another from the same deck. You need 3 decks of cards with different-colored backs to use these rules: one deck should have red backs, one should have blue backs, and one should be clearly distinct from the other two. You will not need jokers.

The four standard decks are:
* 1) Bribe the Ref (blue hearts/diamonds), 10 essentially work as an automatic bribe, while the other 16 yield some other advantage (an automatic penalty for fouling, or the old Injury Time, or whatever). Most of these cards will be useful, but six of them will be challenging to get good mileage out of. All will be usable only in-game.
* 2) Dirty Tricks (blue spades/clubs): 26 cards, mostly stuff to help you in game, but some stuff to give you extra money (say, 3 cards) or screw your opponent. Intended to be a good mix of effects similar to those in the other decks. 6 situational/weak/hard-to-use cards.
* 3) Random Events (red hearts/diamonds): 26 cards, with a higher balance of league effects (say, 5 cards that impact the next game) and a lower balance of game effects (like 21 cards). 6 situational/weak/hard-to-use cards, including 2 cards that screw your opponent but don't help you much.
* 4) Special Plays (red spades/clubs): 26 cards, with all of them having an immediate in-game effect, and only one benefiting the team beyond the game. 6 situational/weak/hard-to-use cards.

The four special decks are:
* 1) Magic Items (clubs). You must have an Alchemist to take a Magic Item. Magic Items sometimes yield money or TD stoppers or healing or whatever, but three Magic Items are scoring cards and four give one of your players an advantage that they may use for the entire game or half. None of these special decks have more than one situational/weak/hard-to-use card.
* 2) Magic Spells (spades). You must have a Wizard to take a Magic Spell. Magic Spells sometimes yield other stuff (lead into gold, mutating a player for a drive, magical healing), but six Magic Spells are TD stoppers.
* 3) Special Staff (hearts). You must have a Manager to take Special Staff. Special staff can yield TD stoppers (assassin) or other effects, but include six healing/protection cards (like Bloodweiser Babes and an extra Apothecary).
* 4) The Twelfth Man (diamonds). You must have a Mascot to take The Twelfth Man. The fans can do all kinds of crazy stuff like run out on the field and screw up the opponent's audibles, but mostly they spend their money, and The Twelfth Man yields four money cards and two FF-modifying cards.

[Joemanji]

Sounds like fun, though interventionist cards caused a lot of grief in 3rd ed.

[mattgslater]

Those kinds of cards can be difference-makers, and I want to be sure that they're not as all-powerful as some of the "best" 3rd-ed burn cards -- specifically, I don't want any automatic TDs/stoppers in the standard decks, and many of the stoppers in the special decks will have some kind of conditional quality or chance of failure (some will be automatic). However, having that sort of thing in the mix reduces stalling on turn 7.