The real issue with the Khorne roster...

[juck101]

I like the Khorne, now give us Tzeentch and Slannesh! And more Goblin teams! And APES! And Robots!

I just like any new teams that have a chance to go through the playtest gauntlet and add to our beloved game.

I think a new team every 2 years or so would be good for the hobby.

This ^
over all else THIS is the best thing for us all

[spubbbba]

I don’t really agree with that.

24 teams is a lot and it’s pretty hard to balance all those without making some obsolete (Necros and pro elfs seem rather pointless to me). On top of that with skill choices you can make some very diverse teams. There are quite a few lame rosters we have currently, amazons, khemri and ogres all spring to mind. So I’d rather they be fixed first before adding new teams.

If we got to the MBBL2 stage with dozens of extra teams, some with tenuous links to the BB world I’d certainly begin lose interest. I really dislike when a “fantasy football” team is actually some daft concept like snow elves with all players dressed as Eskimos and bears no resemblance to a Bloodbowl team. It’s cool as a 1 off conversion but I’d hate to see those kinds of teams brought into the game.

[Smeborg]

I feel that a degree of imbalance between races is an important structural element of our hobby. It is one of the things that prevents it being overly serious and "chess-like". In a friendly TT league, it enables rookie and veteran coaches to play together with an approximation of balance. I would go even further and say that if the races were "perfectly balanced" (assuming of course that that is possible), the hobby would not have grown to where it is today.

All the best.

[GalakStarscraper]

If we got to the MBBL2 stage with dozens of extra teams, some with tenuous links to the BB world I’d certainly begin lose interest.

I loved playing in the MBBL2. I would not want BB to officially become the MBBL2.

Tom

[SunDevil]

spubbbba - I can understand not wanting too many new teams too fast and I completely agree. But a few new teams every once in a while that go through the year-plus rigors of playtesting like the lrb6.0 rosters did would be cool with me. Smeborg suggested 1 new team every two years and that soulds good to me. It would be like Roster Idol seeing the candidates get whittled down.

I'd also like to see some existing teams be made more different, more unique - the Necro (like you said) are a prime example and also the number of Elf teams could be paired down some.

There are quite a few lame rosters we have currently, amazons, khemri and ogres all spring to mind. So I’d rather they be fixed first before adding new teams.

But this is crazy talk! I love the Khemri (except the Decay) and I think Ogres are an appropriate mix of fun and difficult. The Amazons, while not a favorite of mine, have their place because out of 24 rosters, they are the only one that has every player sharing a starting statline - 6337. Just looking at them, they may seem boring, but held up against the other 23 rosters, they stand out as being truly unique.

I'm just messing with you, man, one of the best thing about BB is the different opinions aboiut rosters! I just couldn't let my Khemri be called lame and let it go.

I would like any new team in the future to come right from the Warhammer mythos, not just be made up for the hell of it. The one exception (for me) - Necrons. 40k I know but would love to see a robot/mech/automaton/Necron team in BB!

[spubbbba]

I would like any new team in the future to come right from the Warhammer mythos, not just be made up for the hell of it. The one exception (for me) - Necrons. 40k I know but would love to see a robot/mech/automaton/Necron team in BB!

Sounds like you need to check out Dreadball then, they have a robot team in that though no sculpts have been shown yet.

The thing about adding teams is they have to bring something new to the game, if Cyanide decide to do an Ocean edition next with Fishmen, Squids, crab people (lots of claw!) and sea elves those would actually need to be different enough from the other teams without adding daft special rules.

If the sea elves were basically the high elf roster with a couple of tweaks (wrestle on the blitzers instead of block, strong arm for safe throw and diving catch for catch) then that team wouldn’t add anything new. There is such a thing as too much choice IMO and I’d hate to see the game watered down with dull rosters.

I have always been a big fan of the “Counts as” rule in GW games and it works in Bloodbowl too. So if you want robots you need to decide what characteristics they’d have, to fit in the bloodbowl world I’d say they’d need to be pretty crude and either magic, clockwork or steam powered (or a combination of those). I couldn’t see them being very dexterous or fast either but able to take a fair amount of punishment.

That sounds like one of the undead rosters to me, so Khemri would be ideal but you could use undead or necro with the ghouls as mechanics or just leave them out.

[SunDevil]

Thanks for the reply spubbbba!

I actually DO have a mech-flavored Undead team made from modded Necrons - the Steel City Ironclads! I just replaced all their arms with arms from Mage Knight, HeroClix and other games. But I would still like to see a Necron roster using current BB rules. I think one could be made that would be unique and balanced and worthy of inclusion.

That said - I agree that new teams should use existing BB rules (new skills should be added VERY sparingly, if ever) and that swapping out one skill for another on a High Elf roster and calling it Sea Elves is a waste of everyone's time. Dropping an Elf team altogether and then revamping it into Sea Elves - maybe. Like you mentioning dropping an Undead team (my choice would be Necro) I would support that as well as making teams more unique by dropping players from certain rosters - Goblins from the Orc team and the Ogre from the Human team for example.

To me, new teams only need to be balanced one way and that is UP. Meaning a new team cannot come in and dominate everyone. That's a broken mechanic and should be avoided at all costs. If a new team comes in and seriously blows, then it can serve as a Tier 3 challenge team and potentially be improved slightly in the future.

Also regarding balance, I think the data collected by the lrb6 committee was phenomenal and should be the model for any future team playtest gauntlet, even though Digger Goreman and I disagree on the existance of said gauntlet.

[Rewslaun]

I have to agree with SunDevil on wanting to see a Necron team. I don't play 40k but I do love the look of those minis.

[burgun824]

I like the Khorne, now give us Tzeentch and Slannesh! And more Goblin teams! And APES! And Robots!

I just like any new teams that have a chance to go through the playtest gauntlet and add to our beloved game.

I think a new team every 2 years or so would be good for the hobby.

This ^
over all else THIS is the best thing for us all

The first domino topples...

If anything we need LESS rosters. Quality over quantity.

[Heff]

Elves are one of my fave teams. not over armoured like helves or auto scorers like welves and with an amazing catcher.

[Rolex]

Thanks for the reply spubbbba!
To me, new teams only need to be balanced one way and that is UP. Meaning a new team cannot come in and dominate everyone. That's a broken mechanic and should be avoided at all costs. If a new team comes in and seriously blows, then it can serve as a Tier 3 challenge team and potentially be improved slightly in the future.

That the reason why up to now Khorne seems to me a good roster (6 games played) and Bretonnia seems quite bad (5 gamesplayed).

[burgun824]

Elves are one of my fave teams. not over armoured like helves or auto scorers like welves and with an amazing catcher.

Yeah...Pro Elves are on my cut list, sorry Heff. But if it helps to balance things out for you I also fall in the "Nerf the Dwarfs" camp.

[Heff]

Elves are one of my fave teams. not over armoured like helves or auto scorers like welves and with an amazing catcher.

Yeah...Pro Elves are on my cut list, sorry Heff. But if it helps to balance things out for you I also fall in the "Nerf the Dwarfs" camp.

My issue with elves is that av8 should be rare on an ag4 team, on that basis helves would get the axe for me and delve linos would be ag7 and 60k. Or possibly all linos/throwers should be av7 for all races get a price cut and away you go. But to be honest I am happy how things are except dwarves need to lose tackle and thick skull.

[spubbbba]

My issue with elves is that av8 should be rare on an ag4 team, on that basis helves would get the axe for me and delve linos would be ag7 and 60k. Or possibly all linos/throwers should be av7 for all races get a price cut and away you go. But to be honest I am happy how things are except dwarves need to lose tackle and thick skull.

So what you're saying is we need to get rid of High Elves and replace them with "Pro Dwarfs"?

[Colin]

It's kinda funny to hear people talking about axing the (pro) elves and the Necro teams. The (pro) elves were introduced as the Elf team to replace the High Elf team. Of course a bunch of people whinged and complained so the HE's were never removed. Necro and Khemri were made to replace the all in one Undead team, but again, people whinged and complained and it was kept. Personally I think the Necro should be just called Undead and ax the all in one Undead team roster (as was supposed to be the case). Get rid of the High Elves and Wood Elves and redesign the Elf roster (only need "good" Elves and Dark Elves IMO). Don't need a team roster to match each WH army out there (that's why we now have a Deamons of Khorne roster, IMO). GW thinks that the specialist games should be "gateway" games that get people into playing the "core" games of WHFB and 40K. That was evident in the 3ed minis that look like WH warriors that stepped off the battlefield to play a game of BB (ie. look similar to WH minis with no weapons). That was being reversed and things were going back to a 2ed feel (teams not mirroring the WH universe, having their own unique feel to them) when Jarvis was running Specialist Games, but then SG was scrapped as a seperate entity and no support given to the specialst games, so we're back with the old GW mindset when new rosters are added (ie Khorne).
So to make a long story short, I'm with the camp that wants less rosters (and some tweeked to work better) instead of more. I would also like to go back to the 2ed way of naming positionals and just have BB names, get rid of the WHFB army unit name infuence. I know there are people who think that the WH names give more "flavour", but that's not the flavour we need in BB. Fantasy football is a parady of gridiron football and should should only have a sports flavour.
I could go on, but post is a little long right now so I'll stop here.