Double 5's on (Norse) Ulfwerener...

Da_Great_MC · Post by **Da_Great_MC** » Mon May 25, 2009 2:37 pm

Sidestep only comes in play when opponents are hitting your Ulfwerener.

I'd take Block or MA7 anytime over Sidestep.

Fondu77 · Post by **Fondu77** » Mon May 25, 2009 2:53 pm

ianwilliams wrote:Sidestep for me. S4 SS Frenzy is a nasty combo anywhere near the sideline.

+1

mattgslater · Post by **mattgslater** » Mon May 25, 2009 3:46 pm

With Side Step, he's a great linebacker. set him up behind the line, inside the wide zone but outside of the LOS, positioned so he can fall to a square on a parallel with the wide zone man, and you don't need to protect him directly. Then get Stand Firm (or if you're so lucky, Block) on the Snow Troll for its #2 improvement and stick him in the middle of the d-line. then you can hold out no matter what (barring Grab, in which case you go to a more ordinary structure and make him try to bring assists.

Of course, you can use him on the corner, to come in off the edge or ward off blitzes going his way. The only downsides here are that you have a ton of potential to defend the sidelines just with Berserkers and Linemen or Runners, and that AG2 players in the weak-side wide zone are relatively easy to remove from a passing play unless the ball is on their side to begin with (the joys of Kick).

On offense, he's very hard to cope with. You can stick him on the corner of the cage, front or back, and the oppo likely won't hit him 'cause he's the worst kind of tar baby.

BIG Pete · Post by **BIG Pete** » Tue May 26, 2009 1:17 am

I agree, SS can be underestimated. He's going to be in the middle of it, so when he gets hit back being able to put him somewhere safe sounds good to me. Just get Block soonish. Even on a double (Barring double 6's of course

)

tenwit · Post by **tenwit** » Tue May 26, 2009 2:56 am

Vote for Side Step. You'll fairly often have a crowdpush and be stuck with a GFI+Dodge to get away from the sideline. Why not just stay there, if you've got SS your opponent mightn't want to hit you those if you're able to step to somewhere that will allow you to crowdpush again next turn..

Carnis · Post by **Carnis** » Thu May 28, 2009 2:45 pm

I seem to be in the minority here, but imo wilhelm chaney's field awesomeness (S4, Wrestle & Frenzy) proves the way to go with ulfs is wrestle + break tackle (later mb/jugger etc).

Wrestle protects against turnovers just as block. This means you won't have to hold back your blocks with your ulfs. Block won't help you get CAS on block-guys (common), whereas wrestle will sometimes help you grab the ball off a block-surehands carrier (common as well). S4+Break tackle dodge is a lot more reliable than ag3 dodges are. Wrestle on ulfs also means you won't have a lineman/blitzer with both block AND wrestle (which have no real synergy).

Juggernaut later will allow you to ignore the drawback of wrestle on offence as well as use frenzy against fending block/blodge players. I would not go AV (AV9 is nice, but you won't put your ulf on the LOS) or MA (he NEEDS the skills, he has the stats).

I might go on and ignore the double & go straight towards wrestle/break tackle. In my own team I'm taking MB on both ulfs for faster SPP generation & due to my heavyish reliance on bash play. Dodge has obvious synergies with a Wrestling/BT ulf, but whether you would ever get up to 16-31 spp's with your dodging ulf I do not know.

Joemanji · Post by **Joemanji** » Thu May 28, 2009 3:05 pm

Side Step for me. Great with Frenzy, even better with ST4. Your opponent will need a stun just to avoid getting one of his own players surfed.

Post by **voyagers_uk** » Thu May 28, 2009 4:02 pm

I would go Side Step too.

tenwit · Post by **tenwit** » Thu May 28, 2009 8:56 pm

Carnis wrote:wrestle + break tackle (later mb/jugger etc).

If you're planning on getting Juggernaut, you shouldn't get Wrestle. Juggernaut works well with Block (Jugg cancels Wrestle, meaning your Block skill is useful), but it's fairly pointless with Wrestle. But one Wrestle/BTackle Ulf and one Block/Jugg one is good.

Carnis · Post by **Carnis** » Thu May 28, 2009 10:09 pm

tenwit wrote:
Carnis wrote:wrestle + break tackle (later mb/jugger etc).
If you're planning on getting Juggernaut, you shouldn't get Wrestle. Juggernaut works well with Block (Jugg cancels Wrestle, meaning your Block skill is useful), but it's fairly pointless with Wrestle. But one Wrestle/BTackle Ulf and one Block/Jugg one is good.

I don't see why it's any less useful with wrestle.

Target1: Lino with Block
Target2: Lino with Wrestle

Blitzer1: Block/Jugger blitzer
Blitzer2: Wrestle/Jugger blitzer

Roll: double bothdowns (or bd + skull).
B1 vs T1 : Nothing happens OR Defender pushed back
B1 vs T2 : Both wrestled down OR Defender Knocked down
B2 vs T1 : Both wrestled down OR Defender pushed back
B2 vs T2 : Both wrestled down OR Defender pushed back

I feel that avoiding being placed prone involuntarily is a big thing for a wrestler, the other thing is blodge/fend ballcarriers (wardancers), who fall pray to wrestle/jugger much better than block/jugger.

mattgslater · Post by **mattgslater** » Thu May 28, 2009 10:48 pm

See, if you ask me, Frenzy + Juggernaut means you don't need Wrestle. Two pushes is almost always enough to put the opponent out of position (barring Side Step), and it preserves your TZ. If you're really worried about Blodgers, go Block/Tackle and get a MB/Jugg or MB/Tackle Blitzer.

Break Tackle is cool, sure, but Norse don't really need it, 'cause anybody can blitz and you can have 5x Frenzy. Often, you can just as easily shove a guy out of the way and run free. One problem Norse have is that they lack access to Grab: a lot of teams with less Frenzy get more value out of Grab because they can stack it (Orcs, developed Necro, CD). To deal with SS, the best strategy is to get/keep a numerical advantage, spread some Guard around, and cope with attendant skills like Fend and Wrestle using a Juggernaut (vs. Pro Elves, a Snow Troll is a great way to mangle Blitzers). Block is good in those cases, as it lets you keep your TZ. Often, it's better to do nothing than to push a SS'er.

Post by **DoubleSkulls** » Fri May 29, 2009 12:41 am

Carnis wrote: B1 vs T2 : Both wrestled down OR Defender Knocked down

You don't think that's useful?

Carnis · Post by **Carnis** » Fri May 29, 2009 7:39 am

mattgslater wrote:See, if you ask me, Frenzy + Juggernaut means you don't need Wrestle. Two pushes is almost always enough to put the opponent out of position (barring Side Step), and it preserves your TZ. If you're really worried about Blodgers, go Block/Tackle and get a MB/Jugg or MB/Tackle Blitzer.

Break Tackle is cool, sure, but Norse don't really need it, 'cause anybody can blitz and you can have 5x Frenzy.

Well in my experience, a lot of coaches use the "famous": lone Blodge/Sure hands ballcarrier (with fend or ss). Inexperienced coaches cause they don't know any better and experienced coaches under duress.

To me it's a big difference between wre/frenzy and fre/jugger or fre/block/jugger and finally wre/fre/jugger.

Defender has Blodge:
Wre/frenzy has 20/36 + 15/36*20/36 chance of wrestling or knocking down the opposition: 28,3/36
Jug/frenzy has 11/36 + 24/36*11/36 chance of knocking down the opposition: 18,3/36
Blo/frenzy has 11/36 + 21/36*11/36 chance of knocking down the opposition: 17,4/36
Blo/jug gives you 11/36 chance of KD
Blo/jug/fre gives you 18,3/36 just like jug/frenzy
Wre/jug/fre gives you 28,3/36 just like wre/frenzy, but cannot be countered with fend.

Jugs is there just for crowdpushes (synergy with BT)/countering fend/avoiding unwanted wrestling on surfs&noncritical blitzes.

And yes, getting knockdowns on wrestlers IS useful use of jug/block. I just feel that you should maximize 2 things with your skills: Common situations (2die blocks, armor/injury rolls, crowdsurfs) and critical situations (Ballcarrier near endzone, turnover gives opportunity for ball turnovers etc). I feel wrestle/bt with one ulf going jugger the other going tackle achieves this best for the norse team. I don't think blitzing wrestle players is either common or critical (ballcarriers *should* have block, jugs doesn't help when blocking).

Sidestep IS great, but I consider the opportunity cost of taking SS as your first skill generally too high even for ulfs.

mattgslater · Post by **mattgslater** » Fri May 29, 2009 2:12 pm

You're just considering the chance of putting the oppo on the ground. If you're blitzing the ball-carrier, this thinking is fine. But if you design an AG2 player as a ball-hound, he's going to get forced to do other stuff, and if you push an opponent two squares with Fruggernaut and keep an ST4 Tackle Zone on him, you have probably totally wrecked his route and are free to block again next turn.

Again, if your worry is Blodgers, what about Tackle?

See, I think the TZ of a ST4 player is too valuable to risk.

McTavish · Post by **McTavish** » Sun Jun 14, 2009 3:36 am

For the record, I wound up taking the +MV for whatever reason. The game was coming up and I just kind of went with it.

Mixed bag so far. MV has been useful twice, once saving me a game as I plowed into a breakaway Skink (and ate him with a nice Bernaise sauce.)

Of course, he's probably run into that "The only player on my team without block" situation more often. Block/Wrestle (or even sidestep) looks like it might've been more useful in the short run.

As far as long term development goes, well... three games later, he's still sitting at 11 SPP. I'm thinking about shoving him into the endzone a couple times next game until he manages to get his stuff in gear and earn the casualties...