Talk Fantasy Football

Hi guys,
homemade team which has seen several versions over the years.

How would you price these players
0-16 Linemen 5338 stand firm G
0-4 Cossacks 6338 stand firm, grab, wrestle GS
0-2 Wings 6338 catch, pass block GA
0-2 Kickers 6338 kick, hail mary pass GA
0-1 Trained bear 4419 tackle, mighty blow, loner, very stupid, secret weapon
ReRolls ??

Cheers
Martin

Broken, is how I'd price them. Too much Stand Firm at any price. I'd take nothing but Linemen and one Kicker, and whip all y'all.

I think you should take Stand Firm off the Lino, make him 40k, with 60k TRRs. The Cossack is really cool, and worth about 100k. You could give them 70k TRRs and make him 90k; he'd be a killer deal, but not in context. You could instead justify 70k TRRs by giving the linemen GS access (don't worry; Stand Firm is a natural #2 selection in context). I'd make the Kickers GP at 70k or GAP at 80k, and the Wings are more like 70k. You could make them MA7/80k if you change the Linos. That would put two of them on the field in most construction; otherwise they'll get ignored (even if you take A off the Kicker).

I don't like the Bear at any price. Bears aren't AG1, or if they are, they have Break Tackle. They certainly aren't MA4 or Really Stupid, and they're probably Wild Animal, even if trained. I don't get Secret Weapon. Why can't you have a bear on the field? You can have a Beast of Nurgle....

Ok, let's assume you definitely want 5 3 3 8 Stand Firm linemen. That's a 60k piece. Stand Firm is awesome, especially after he gets block, the obvious first advance.

Then I think you need to drop the Cossak, or else remove Stand Firm from him. That much Stand Firm on the linemen should mean no Stand Firm on the positionals. I would probably opt to keep him in the game, and remove Stand Firm and Wrestle,Just leaving Grab. For 6 3 3 8 Grab, I'd charge 80k, for 6 3 3 8 Grab, Wrestle, that's a 90k piece.

Your Kicker is interesting. But a kicker should be AV 7 in my book, or the same stats as a linemen. So 5 3 3 8 or 6 3 3 7, and in both cases cost at 70k... I'd give him Pass access and remove Agility if it were me.

That brings me to the Wing... Catch Pass Block is a good combo, 6 3 3 8 is pretty blah. Does this team, with it's awesome linemen, need this piece? Do the skills need to mesh so well together? I would recommend a little bit more of a fragile piece, maybe 7 3 3 7 or 7 2 3 7 ? Catch OR Pass Block would be fine. Diving Catch Pass Block would be really fun.

The trained bear, I like the idea, but not the implementation. Just copy and paste what Matt said... If I were choosing a Big man for this team, I would go with:

Trained Bear: 6 4 2 8 Loner, No Hands, Wild Animal, Frenzy, Break Tackle 110k

Frenzy doesn't combo well with Stand Firm... so the bear is a negative...

Just my initial thoughts... certainly the beginnings of a fun team though- similar to how I feel about the MBBL Hobgoblins.

Jural wrote: Frenzy doesn't combo well with Stand Firm... so the bear is a negative...

REALLY?

1st turn, put a man on the corner of the sideline. Breaktackle dodge on a 2+ to get on the backfield, and crowdsurf any non-sidestepping sideliner (even if protected by a corner).

SF+Frenzy is a standard combination on trollslayers and ulfwereners..

Hi guys,
wow - I guess this wouldn't be TBB of someone didn't cry "broken".
But I'm more than a little surprised.
A team with good linemen, true, but utterly mediocre statlines, marginal skills and a shoddy big guy. Broken?

Good news first - looks like we agree pretty much on pricing. I was thinking linemen (60), cossacks (100), wings (70) and kickers (70).

I'm open to discussion, but I'd better tell you what I'm trying to do, so we're on the same page:
Team: Kislev
Niche: A very strong defense team. Note that defense and bashing is not the same thing! With a strong defense it is important that they don't have an impressive offense.

The Linemen
Given that the team has no outstanding stats, they need something, and I went with Stand Firm. Fend could be a decent substitute, but as a coach I don't think I'd bother playing them.

Now, if it was the old stand firm, with the auto-dodge ability, I might see broken. But the new stand firm as a specialist skill that very few players bother to take. Seriously. IMO, it almost only sees play on pieces that can combo up with guard. And that combo is good. But as half-a-combo, it's the wrong half. IMO it's a lot less crazy than a team with all block or all dodge.

I get that it's a skill that gets better in bulk. But even so, the team has plenty of weaknesses. I should also note that we've previously playtested with sidestep on the linemen (back when stand firm was better). I consider sidestep a stronger skill in bulk, and that team did not dominate the league.

One important comment: I went with 5338 rather than 6337, because a defense team with AV7 would (IMO) be dead in the water. That's generally why I've acoided AV7 on this team.

Cossacks
I gave these MA6 rather than 5, because I think you need a bit of MA on defense to be able to sack (cos-sack, get it ) anyone. If linemen go to fend, then I kind of think these should too. I like the unity either way.
I gave him wrestle because it's good for dropping people, but also because it is a skill that isn't very good for bashers. It won't combo well with mighty blow, piling on - hopefully encouraging a different development.
Grab was added as another marginal skill that almost nobody picks. I wanted to see it get some play, which it doesn't now.

Jural said:

For 6 3 3 8 Grab, I'd charge 80k

Really?
You'd charge 30K for that marginal skill, even though block is 20K on most players?
I really don't get that.

Kickers
As stated, I don't want a good offense on this team, so I don't want both A and P access on the team. One or the other. And I prefer A, because it has defensive staples like dodge, side step and diving tackle. That's why he doesn't have P - even though I've considered it. I've also set the team's MA limit to 6, but 7 might be acceptable.

Anyway, I chose a kicker for the team because I found it unique, and because he wouldn't help on offense too much.

Kick is a great skill (though redundant on the 2nd kicker).
HMP is another marginal skill. Really marginal.
I went with MA6 to make him more attractive for the team, and because he's the guy fetching the ball.

Jural said:

So 5 3 3 8 or 6 3 3 7, and in both cases cost at 70k

Ouch. They'd certainly be paying top dollar for their skills. Especially if they are 6337!

Wings
The team's ball mover piece, but also with a defensive purpose.
Again, I limited MA to 6, and took AV7 for the reasons explained above.

Jural said:

Catch Pass Block is a good combo, [snip]. Does this team, with it's awesome linemen, need this piece?

Jural - you and me just ain't connecting
Yes, it's a combo. I wouldn't really call it a good combo.
Pass block is another skill that rarely gets picked. In theory it's nice, but there are so many ways to work around it that in reality it's a rare pick. Very rare on non-elfs. But catch is nice.

Jural said:

maybe 7 3 3 7 or 7 2 3 7 ? Catch OR Pass Block would be fine

So 7237 pass block would be fine? A player priced harshly 50K.
Probably the worst positional in the game. I can't see anyone hiring such a player.

Now I could see pass block + diving catch, because DC combos better with the kickers. And then catch would be a cute skill progression pick - though in reality it would probably be third skill after blodge.
In the same way, for a pass-block + catch piece, DC looks like a good choice - faaar down the line.

Finally The Bear
If the team has power issues, then this piece could go.
Might fit a star player better anyway.

My thinking on this may be dated, but it harks back to "gold edition" when the unicorn was briefly introduced. Now that was a flamewar! Creatures/animals have no place on the pitch. Otherwize, I look forward to the high elf defender #11 taking out an orc team with a swipe of his spiked tail and some fire-breath!
OK, the Beast of Nurgle kind of breaks that rule, but he's the only one.
To my eye, BB is for humanoids and there must be an (unmentioned) rule against other critters on the pitch.
That's why I gave it secret weapon.

That's also the explanation for the statline. It's slow and doesn't have break tackle because it's walking upright. It's trained to do that. And as such, it could carry the ball, hence no no-hands.

Very Stupid over Wild Animal because, well, it's trained. It's not a bear rampaging all over the pitch. It's an animal that needs to be told what to do by someone. I mean, it's an animal - it's gotta be dumber than a troll.

Phew. Food for thought I hope
I hope I don't come across as rude. Frustrated is more like it
Finally, Mattgslater said:

I'd take nothing but Linemen and one Kicker, and whip all y'all.

Again I'm gonna hve to say - really?
Like I said, there is some playtest behind this, so it hasn't been created in complete vacuum.
But - do you play pbem?
'cause I'll soon be setting up a tournament with some alternative teams, including the final version of Kislev.
You're more than welcome to prove your point

Cheers
Martin

I have played this team with side step on the linemen for 50+ games in a big league with som of the best danish players, and some of the most liable to complain about broken rules. And I did pretty good, but I have never heard a single opponant even suggest that the team was close to broken. actuelly the team got a boost one or two seasons later (MA + on the wings), because noone was playing them, and stil noone was considering them broken.

My impression is the the vast majority of TBBs consider side step superior to stand firm, and they stack in about the same way. So I have no reason to think that this team is broken.

There are a few things I dont like though. The MA 6 on the cossacks is a mistake imo. The team struggles on offence and should struggle on offence. The main reason for that is the low MA, and that is what makes the wings great players on a kislev team. Players that would proberbly miss the cut on most other teams, at least at the price I payed for them. Dont know is the cossacks should gain something for the lost MA, but I think they should be MA 5.

I dont like the bear with secret weapon. At what cost would it be worth it? As a star fine. Without a big guy I think the team wil struggle, and they would certainly need to guard up those cossacks - and bashy skills would be far off. Maby some dauntless on the cossacks insted of the MA would make the team playable without a big guy. And they are used to figting chaos warriors. But maby 4 skill starters is to much? I think you should maby remove grab then.

Cossacks: 5 3 3 8 stand firm, wrestle, dauntless

Hi Trips,
thanks for joining

Hmmm.. You may be right about the cossacks MA. 5 would be fair. Dauntless is an option, but it would definately come at the cost of grab. Kind of depends on the big guy.

Kislev, being strongly anti-chaos, can't really use any ordinary big guy. But I could do the bear without secret weapon - but is it silly? I'd rather have no bear, than doing something silly/strange.

One more thing I've thought about: Even though I don't want them to have a strong offense, perhaps P-access would be OK. It would still simulate kicking - but precision kicking would take a lot of building! They lack sure hands, pass and accurate. All they have is the access. And if the kickers have P (not A), then the A on the wings would also be more attractive.

Final, final thought - and not sure I like it:
Instead of 4 cossack +2 kicker + 2 wing + 1 bear, it could be:
4 cossack, 4 wing, 1 kicker...(?)

Cheers all
Martin

Is the bear silly?

Is anyone else playing a game pushing little green men, treemen, werewolves, zombies and strange mutating rat-things on a cardboard pitch. i don't think the bear is too daft considering the whole game should be taken with a slice of humour.

I like the linos with stand firm. It would take a long time to skill up many of them so the skills that stack with it would be a long time coming in bulk. 5338 SF 60k would be right imo.

Bearing in mind the relative high lino cost the positional should be cheap, no more than 90k imo.

A cossack 6338 grab wrestle would be right imo for 80k.

The offence players is where it gets tricky. I like the kicker and the wings as per the original post. The issues for me are the skill access and movement. If all positionals are MA6 then you end up with 8 MA6 pieces. Is this faster than the idea you had for the team, if son then Reduce the movement of the Cossacks. Personally i don't see the MA6 as an issue, gieven the otherwise lack of any real offensive skills. For skills access, agility on the wings is a must. Kickers to get pass or agility? pass would fit better imo as there would be less overlap with the wings, and the low movement would limit the passing games usefullness.

I like the bear, but would go with a relatively untrained no hands bear with wild animal, as while you could teach it to dance, trying to direct which people to attack, or stop it from attacking when in a game would be a situation where control is lost.

Carnis wrote:

Jural wrote: Frenzy doesn't combo well with Stand Firm... so the bear is a negative...

REALLY?

1st turn, put a man on the corner of the sideline. Breaktackle dodge on a 2+ to get on the backfield, and crowdsurf any non-sidestepping sideliner (even if protected by a corner).

SF+Frenzy is a standard combination on trollslayers and ulfwereners..

Frenzy on your bear doesn't combo great with Stand Firm on the linemen. The linemen are entrenched, and the bear is getting out of position. Not horrible either.

Ok, let's give this a shot...

plasmoid wrote: Jural said:

For 6 3 3 8 Grab, I'd charge 80k

Really?
You'd charge 30K for that marginal skill, even though block is 20K on most players?
I really don't get that.

Yeah, I agree. I was costing him as an orc blitzer which is 6 3 3 9. 70k is fine with the one skill. 60k maybe too, but team wide Stand Firm leaves me more conservative.

Jural said:

So 5 3 3 8 or 6 3 3 7, and in both cases cost at 70k

Ouch. They'd certainly be paying top dollar for their skills. Especially if they are 6337!

Kick is an extremely valuable and specialty skill, and I think it's even inappropriate to put it on a starting piece! But since this is a kicker... I valued it at 20k. Hobgoblin +30k is 70k!

Jural said:

Catch Pass Block is a good combo, [snip]. Does this team, with it's awesome linemen, need this piece?

Yes, it's a combo. I wouldn't really call it a good combo.
Pass block is another skill that rarely gets picked. In theory it's nice, but there are so many ways to work around it that in reality it's a rare pick. Very rare on non-elfs. But catch is nice.

Catch Pass Block is again a very speciaized piece that most teams don't get... When you have Kick, mass Stand Firm, and Wrestle Stand Firm Cossak's on a starting roster, I'm wary of Pass Block players who can pick up dodge and Diving Tackle on normal rolls.

Jural said:

maybe 7 3 3 7 or 7 2 3 7 ? Catch OR Pass Block would be fine

So 7237 pass block would be fine? A player priced harshly 50K.
Probably the worst positional in the game. I can't see anyone hiring such a player.

I could be more clear, I guess. 7 2 3 7 Diving Catch Pass Block or 7 3 3 7 Pass Block, both for 60k.

Finally The Bear
If the team has power issues, then this piece could go.
Might fit a star player better anyway.

The bear is an odd piece, and I guess if he is standing on his hind legs the whole time the statline works? Kinda a reach- but at STR 4 he isn't a problem on this team.

Frenzy on one guy and Stand Firm on several others is indeed really good. All the Stand Firm guys ensure that the Frenzy guy always has the assists and protective TZs he needs.

Beware Grab; it's not weak, it's advanced. If you give people a chance to build combos around it, it's a great way to generate 1TTDs and extra blocks on offense (maybe not 1TTDs for this team, but 1x Grab, 1x Frenzy = 1 or even 2 extra blocks on offense). It's also really nasty for clearing defenders off the front of the cage, or on defense for clearing blockers off the ball-carrier. It has all sorts of cool combo value with Stand Firm, and with either Stand Firm or Frenzy on other players. I'd price it as a good skill. 20k seems about right.

For the wings, Catch + Pass Block combos, while Diving Catch + Pass Block does not. I'm in favor of 7/3/3/7 at 70k, or even 7/3/3/8 at 90k. On MA7, Shadowing + Pass Block might be a good option, or even 7/3/3/7 Shadowing, Catch and Pass Block at 80k.

I still think an all-Stand Firm team would be gnarly beyond belief. You'd be able to game for it a bit, but no Juggy, no way in.

mattgslater wrote:Frenzy on one guy and Stand Firm on several others is indeed really good. All the Stand Firm guys ensure that the Frenzy guy always has the assists and protective TZs he needs.

With a STR 4 Frenzy piece and no STR access on your linemen, I'm not sure I agree there. Certainly the Stand Firm doesn't hurt, but in my opinion the tactics and formations you are using don't benefit as much from Frenzy as teams without the Stand Firm linemen.

but anyway... I use Stand Firm on my Chaos Dwarves, it is actually a suprisingly good skill, I think it's on par with guard, and outperforms Mighty Blow.

Jural wrote:

mattgslater wrote:Frenzy on one guy and Stand Firm on several others is indeed really good. All the Stand Firm guys ensure that the Frenzy guy always has the assists and protective TZs he needs.

With a STR 4 Frenzy piece and no STR access on your linemen, I'm not sure I agree there. Certainly the Stand Firm doesn't hurt, but in my opinion the tactics and formations you are using don't benefit as much from Frenzy as teams without the Stand Firm linemen.

but anyway... I use Stand Firm on my Chaos Dwarves, it is actually a suprisingly good skill, I think it's on par with guard, and outperforms Mighty Blow.

You rate stand firm/guard better than mb with claw/po as well?

@Martin: Have you got any playtesting results on the stand firm Cockerel?

@ matt: Maby you are right, and the mass stand firm is way over the top, but why dont you just make an all stand firm team out of dwarfs, orcs, chaos or something like that? I though about doing it with orcs, but then I never got any spp for my black orcs, an the sole one with a skill died, and I got frustrated with the team. But this is an all AV 8ish team without much bash. Back in the good old days, just before I played this team I strongly adviced against stand firm as the lineman skill, becauce it was clearly overpowered at the time. They ended up with side step insted. Do you consider mass stand firm to be better than mass side step? This team has MA as the big weekness, MA 6 cossacks kind of messes that up, but given that this is fixed I think the team is playable.

That leads me to my next point

7/3/3/7 Shadowing, Catch and Pass Block at 80k.

That is a bargin! And it might even make the team broken. I believe I payed 90 k for 6338 catch, pass block, and I surely needed the players.
On this particular team, like on dwarf and no other teams, I think. 7337 is way better that 6338. As I said before the wings are the stars of this team, not on defence, but on offence.

I get your point about grab. I can see it comboing very well with stand firm, and thats another reason to remove the big guy and give dauntless insted of grab.

Cossacks are not blitzer types, they are blockers. Changing them to blitzers kills the spirit of the team imo. I would in fact like to se them with 5339 or 5329, but maby AV 9 is to good? The essential part is, that the MA is reduced to 5.

All this being said in defence of the Cockerel, I acctually think am all fend AV 8 Cockerel would be fun and could work.

@ Tripleskull: it's very hard to make an all-Stand Firm team out of anything. Chaos need Block, and Dwarfs and Orcs have players who develop sporadically. I also think that if you did a large scale retest of the SS team, you'd find them much better now than then: I've been following this site for a few years now, and the upper level of sophistication with positioning skill use (at least among people on this forum) has crept upwards somewhat. I also think that if you spammed it across the roster, Stand Firm would be at least as good as Side Step:
* The anti-SS skill can be used on a block and is pretty good in its own right. It's underutilized now, but if there were an all SS ST3 team Grab would move ahead of Tackle or Frenzy in the common wisdom. The anti-SF skill combos well with Frenzy and also works against Wrestle so you see it in many teams' toolboxes, but it's limited to one use per turn, so you can't tailor to deal with it.
* SS in large doses is a headache for everybody, and will lead to mistakes and dilemmas across the board. SF in large doses will mostly just hang up the opponent; it's hard to screw SF up, except occasionally by using it when not using it would be better (rare). Frequently with SS you find yourself wishing you could just stay where you were.
* SS doesn't stop follow-ups. SF does. On a onesy-twosy basis this doesn't mean much. Across the board it's huge. Go back into threads about reworking Amazons and read what people have to say about playtesting an all-Fend roster. Then remember that Stand Firm is Fend on 'roids.

@ Carnis: I'm with Jural that Stand Firm is the second best S skill for an ST3 player (I think the top 4 are pretty close together). Stand Firm +Block + MB is better than Block + MB + Claw or PO, yes: you'll get almost as many casualties off of Stand Firm, because 1/3 of all attempts to get you off your target are moved from "push" to "nothing." Against the grind, that's not as big a deal (it sure helps in cagebreaking!), but against mid-range teams like DE, Norse, Humans and Amazons, it's extremely frustrating, and it matters against speed (though it's not worldbreaking if the opponent has some Leap and lots of MA to go along with 2+ dodges, like non-dark elves and Skaven).

If you could get MB and Claw or PO in a single skill, that would change the equation.

If you want the Kossacks to be Blocker-types (not sure why an all-Stand Firm team needs Blockers), they should be cheap (80k or less) or AV9 and 90k or less, or you'll tend to see only one of them on the line as a vehicle for Guard until a team gets to high level and starts picking them up as rookies. Price is a real deterrent on a Blocker. Note also that they'll skill at a Zombie's pace if they have Wrestle (a little faster with Stand Firm, but not much; on the LOS they'll be subject to multiple blocks).

I was comparing Wings to Ghouls in my head: 3 crappy skills ~ Dodge + 10k on a starting positional. You could make them 90k... if the Kossacks are really Blockers, you could make the Wings 100k and give them AV8.