FUMBBL Orcs: Wildsquigz need improvement advice

[mattgslater]

Had some good improvements, some good games, and a pyrrhic victory or two with my Orcs, and now I'm in a very different place. Aarkhag is dead, Garkherl and Eshmoghrakh retired. An asterisk indicates a player who's about to improve.

http://fumbbl.com/FUMBBL.php?page=team& ... _id=647242

So, here are the players that have me scratching my head.

Thrower #1: Blargmarkh will go Block at 16 and follow with Fend. His Dodge skill more or less assures that. But do I buy another offensive Thrower to replace Aarkhag, or do I lean on Jarromrolrg for deep retrieval? I don't like that idea, because it doesn't give me maximum access to my 1TTD game like Aarkhag did: I need my statfreak to pound it in. Blargmarkh may eventually get Accurate, but Kickoff Return is just never going to be on his menu. The problem is that my new A-name Thrower is going to be a drag on the team until he skills twice.

Crogthnakk: Guard, Fend, or Grab? SS/Grab/ST4 is tons o' fun, and with Jarromrolrg, an instance of Grab gives me a pretty solid 1TTD effort, but my none-too-sexy 12-5-9 record tells me I should start thinking more practically. Fend will help keep him alive, but I need more Guard. He won't get great use out of it, as he's primarily an edge-setter, and I try to drive action into his face. But I need more. I'm leaning Guard....

Horkadakk: Guard or Frenzy? I can't shake the feeling that I don't have quite enough Guard, but I could also use more firepower. Really, it may be a question of Guard for Crogthnakk and Frenzy for Horkadakk, or Guard for Horkadakk and Grab or Fend for Crogthnakk.

Jarromrolrg: Pro or Fend? He'd get great use out of Pro, but I want to keep him alive.

[Hitonagashi]

Horkadakk: I'd go tackle I think. Tricky one...guard and frenzy are both good! With his ST though, I think he'd make a perfect tackle mb po +st player to obliterate an elf team, or just give you an equal punching chance against the killer chaos teams.

Jarromrolrg: Have you considered sure hands? It gives you the option of picking it up deep with him and just running it fairly reliably. He'll be better than your thrower for picking it up, and a mv 8 ag 4 player is great for running the ball!

Crogthnakk: Guard. Guard Block SS. Mmm.


I wouldn't get another thrower. He's a drag on your TV, and you don't need one. Outside casual R games, you are unlikely to one turn with a mv 8 player in a tournament...enough so that the thrower is really the most likely bit of it. Take it slow with the existing one till you get accurate as well as fend.

That's how I'd play it anyway.

[klauser]

Thrower: Block, then KOR/Accurate; I wouldn't hire another Thrower due to TV considerations

Blorc: Guard, seems like the perfect choice with SS already

ST4 Blitzer: Frenzy, then Stand Firm or Guard (depending on how badly you need additional Guarders)

Freak Elf Blitzer: I'd go for Tackle to make him a mobile safety/hunter type, or Sure Hands to turn him into a ball hawk.

Also, I'd probably cut a RR down to 3.

[mattgslater]

Jarromrolrg: Have you considered sure hands? It gives you the option of picking it up deep with him and just running it fairly reliably. He'll be better than your thrower for picking it up, and a mv 8 ag 4 player is great for running the ball!

My thinking went like this: Jarromrolrg blitzes a lot, takes a lot of ball actions, and often has no TRR to use. Sure Hands is great for pickups, but doesn't help him blitz, catch, or GFI. Tackle is great for blitzing, but doesn't help with the ball. Pro is better than nothing for blitzing (sometimes better than Tackle), and okay for all the little 2+ rolls he makes, like pickups, GFI, dodges, and catches.

I wouldn't get another thrower. He's a drag on your TV, and you don't need one. Outside casual R games, you are unlikely to one turn with a mv 8 player in a tournament...enough so that the thrower is really the most likely bit of it. Take it slow with the existing one till you get accurate as well as fend.

I think you're right, though if I do get myself a mechanism for triple-chaining without a blitz, it won't be that hard; two blocks for push, two for push/pow, a comp, a 1d blitz, and two GFIs (plus a dodge if the 1d jobbie fails to pow). No blitz needed (and a second bite at the chain apple) if opponent is below 8 men. Hardly even money, but quite conceivable. Should I get Accurate before Fend on the Thrower? Before Block? If I don't replace the Thrower, I'll soon be pushing 2M with 12 men. This seems risky to me, as Orcs down men can get kind of stinky. (Down men = upwind?) Should I grab a Goblin, perhaps?

Also, I'd probably cut a RR down to 3.

I did that, then had to buy another one. My style with Orcs just likes that fourth TRR too much. I agree, though: it looks extraneous on paper.

Crogthnakk will get Guard, Horkadakk Frenzy as a lead-up to PO or SF. Reviewing that game, I'm not as freaked out about facing all that Guard: my opponent's 1d blocks were crazy lucky all day, and without all those straight pows (okay, pows and stumbles), I probably could have held my own.

[mattgslater]

Okay, now... it's been a long, rough patch. It's not as bad as my 4-2-6 start, but having fallen from my peak of 9-3-6 to 12-8-10 has not been the best of times: that's still my worst BB record with any team in 5 or more games (had a 1-1-2 team once, been 0-2 two other times, but both times went on a tear after that). A lot of the problem has been injuries and replacements. I could use another one of them winning streaks. Lately, I've been getting as many knockdowns as I've been giving, even though my blocks are almost all 2d or 3d and my opponents' are a grab bag of 1/2d, 1d, and 2d, and I'm throwing 50% more blocks. And when that's happening, the team that blocks less tends to win. But you can't rely on that happening or not: sometimes the overblocker breaks through and the second half is a one-sided slaughter, and sometimes you have an ugly stalemate where he who picks up the ball wins the game. Worse, I've had a few clock-related brain farts, like stalling out of scoring range on T7. Rrrr.

Blargmarkh has Block. I got a replacement for Aarkhag. He skilled, doubled, took Dodge, and promptly got -MA. I Apothed into dead, and gave my opponent a Zombie, because we weren't going to have him stuffed and mounted, like we did with Aarkhag. My bash sense wants to give Blargmarkh Tackle at 31, but practicality says Accurate: part of my problem has been a lack of confidence in my ability to deliver the ball without Aarkhag and his 2+ QP roll. 8/9 with no RR is too risky, but 35/36 is okay.

Crogthnakk got Guard. Drogmarkh is 1SPP away from Stand Firm. Fnorgrerm is on track at 23 SPP. Grab or Stand Firm next? The new BOB has been a terrible disappointment, and I've started to wonder about replacing him with a pair of Goblins and trying to get me a Sneaky Git. Sneaky Git is tempting for my style, because a) I don't sell out to foul very often (only when I control the pitch), and b) getting a free AV roll on a dangerous player is often a big deal. Even if it's not at a bonus, SG means if I fail, I've got you marked with Dodge. But I'd rather have a BOB with Block, so dammit, catch the freaking ball! Or hurt somebody. Or get open. Stop giving up pows on 1d and 1/2d blocks! Rrrrr.....

Garkherl's replacement has Guard, and is a useful bit player. I feel like I have enough Guard, once again, which means maybe I need one more, just in case. Horkadakk just doubled in the last game; I gave him Side Step, because the Crogthnakk-Garkherl duo factored heavily into my win streak, and Horky has not held his ground on the edge of a half-zig, even with Guard next to him. I can probably get a take-back on this before the next game, but I'm pretty happy with the pick. I'm not going back to the I-zig, though; I'm going to run parallel wings against speed, because Jarromrolrg can go wherever he wants! Garkherl's main problem was that he took too many 2d hits (and had bad luck with the resulting injuries). Horkadakk is ST4, and if I can get a guy next to him, then wide left plays are as impossible as wide right.

I cut Nnarnargmogh: this team is about toughness. We gave him a nice parting gift, because orcs can live years with a niggling injury, and we don't want him to come back some night when we don't expect it. I hired his replacement, #12, Llurkhmarg. He has the short legs and big arms you want in a blocker, though until he gets a break he's going to find that he mostly babysits the snots on the sidelines, and sometimes comes in to lay a boot on a downed player, or show up on T8 to earn MVP eligibility. If he does something, he may find himself on the receiving end of some action.

I hired a Goblin, but he niggled almost instantly, so we ate him. Better him than anybody else.

I've learned every 3-4 games, I can take on a bash team that's 60k-90k ahead of me, and pick up a Wizard out of petty cash to even the odds. I recommend this strongly. When it hasn't worked for me, it's been because of freakiness like quad-skulls on the resulting blitz. Or because I've forgotten to use it. Only have 100k in Treasury right now.