Why were Blood Bowl teams designed to be tiered?

[Saebelsultan]

I was dicussing this with a mate. While we generally agreed that the current tier system within the Blood Bowl teams is good as it is, we were wondering why it was conceived this way? So the question is:

Why were Blood Bowl teams designed to be tiered and not to be all equal?

[Pedda]

To offer a challenge for experienced players?

To lighten up games perhaps. If you're playing a tier 3 team, you'll probably not take it as serious.

[Loki]

As I understand it, part of it is a recognition of how sports actually work i.e. it is highly unlikely that Manchester United are likely to loose to 'Bob's Pub Team' - the races give the game diversity and allow for a mismatch.

If you want two 'equal' teams then you have to have a system like chess and even there there is a recognition that going 1st is an advantage. If things are not 'equal' anyway, why not embrace it and actually make it part of the game rather than some perpetual 'meta-game/powercreep' tinkering program - who would do that

[Regash]

Since those tiers are never mentioned in any rulebook that I know of, I think it is something made by the community.
The teams themselves were probably developed with lore and fun in mind, rather than actual difficulty of playing them.

[lunchmoney]

Since those tiers are never mentioned in any rulebook that I know of, I think it is something made by the community.
The teams themselves were probably developed with lore and fun in mind, rather than actual difficulty of playing them.

Plus this paragraph that is right before the rosters:

Designer's Note: Some teams are more challenging than the others to play either because of their skills requiring advanced strategies to be effective or because they have difficulty winning. These teams have been designed this way on purpose to give challenges to coaches who master the basics of Blood Bowl. These more challenging teams are: Chaos, Dark Elf, Goblin, Halfling, Khemri, Nurgle, Ogre and Vampire. Coaches should be aware that these are considered teams for more advanced players and can be confusing or difficult to use if you are new to the game.

[voyagers_uk]

lol

[Digger Goreman]

lol

Ditto!

Never accuse gw of concious design.... Regash is closer to the truth than further away....

Witness the current male chicken-ups in "2016" and the need of the past BBRC to contend with and modify the Khemri roster....

Gw wouldn't know a good rules set if they contracted an outside company to write it!

[Regash]

Yep, some are designed to be more challenging and the rulebook acknowledges that.
But still no f**king word about any tiers, is there?!?

This tier-crap comes solely from the tournament scene, nothing else.

[spubbbba]

Wasn't it the BBRC who brought up the tier system?

I suspect goblins and halflings are awful as the fluff made a point about that being the case. So when the rules for them in 3rd edition were written they were made deliberately weak.

The Blood Bowl tiers have pretty much everyone in tier 1 and they are all roughly equal and the joke teams in tier 3 with the likes of vamps and underworld in 2 or 1.5.

[dode74]

BBRC designed the tiers.

[gjnoronh]

Blaming GW for team balance that is the result of 6 generations of LRB tinkering by BBRC between GW editions seems a bit strange.
GW took the fan adjusted rules of LRB6 and made some very minor tweaks to give us BB16.

The tiering of the teams and overall team rules in general is a result of LRB6 (unless you think weeping daggers, Timberr, and human catchers at 60K has somehow changed the power balance.)

[GalakStarscraper]

Bummer to see history keep getting lost.

Yes the Tiers were a deliberate design feature of the Blood Bowl design by the BBRC with full approval from Games Workshop to do so.

Very frequently during the design process on this website the Tiers were discussed at length and how teams were reaching those points.

Sorry Digger and Regash ... they were conscious and very planned out and GW approved. Just because we did not spell them out in the rulebook exactly does not mean they were not a heavy part of the new rules design.

This webpage is correct for the information on the Tiers.
http://bbowl.wikia.com/wiki/Current_Blood_Bowl_Teams

[DinoTitanedition]

So when the game was released first, and I do not mean redesigned versions after 3rd edition, Jervis Johnson had tiers in mind? Sorry mate...I believe Regash brought it exactly to the point: the original intention was fun and nothing else. The more serious stuff came in way later....with a different style of hobbyists.

[hutchinsfairy]

Not only were the teams deliberately tiered but the tiers themselves were explicitally defined as part of the rules creation process.

To quote Galak from around when LRB6 was released:

Tier 3: Ogre, Halfling, Goblin
Tier 2: Vampire, Underworld
Tier 1: Everybody else

Tier 1 is defined as winning on average in league play 45% to 55% of the time. (with ties counting as 1/2 wins)
Tier 2 is defined as 35% to 45%
Tier 3 is defined as 25% to 35%

http://talkfantasyfootball.org/viewtopi ... 87#p479287

I have no idea of the notion of tiers existed from the inception of Blood Bowl or was a happy accidental that was later adopted and codified into the rules design process. Either way, to answer the OP, current Blood Bowl teams were designed to be tiered.

[hutchinsfairy]

Yep, some are designed to be more challenging and the rulebook acknowledges that.
But still no f**king word about any tiers, is there?!?

This tier-crap comes solely from the tournament scene, nothing else.

Yes, the teams are divided into groups based on difficulty and this is mentioned in the rulebook. Is "tier" one of your trigger words or something?