Looking for good Nurgle resources/advice

[Wanchor]

Wanchor, there are 57 pages of uninformed opinions, I didn't care to waste my time reading all of it.
http://fumbbl.com/FUMBBL.php?page=team& ... _id=648175
This is my new team on fumbbl.
As you can see, no TV bloat by going more killy, C-Pomb online and Tackle MB within 16 games.
And a 10/4/2 record in Blackbox, low TV being Nurgle's worst range.
Maybe a slayer build is better than some stand firm that doesn't stymie agility teams at all?!

You must realize how pompous you seem.

[PorkSol]

Admittedly, stand firm is really annoying to play against if you can't remove the guys with stand firm.

But doesn't picking stand firm on your second skill leave you with few tools to fight back against an opponent who will happily just kill your stand firm units?

Jimmy has now established that a killer nurgle can be built up quickly even in a cut throat environment.

So I'd be curious to hear how stymie would be effective against a team like that, when units will be leaving the pitch quite quickly. Sure, when you have 11 guys on the pitch your defense looks impenetrable. But soon you'll have 8.

A standard bashy build can at least hope to win the kickoff, get a man advantage on turn one and out bash him.

[mattgslater]

I keep hearing this "against a team like that" stuff. That's kind of the point of the stymie style. When you're playing in a format with a dominant composition, you have to build to that composition. When you're not, you have to build against many different opponents.

Stand Firm is a fair skill against non-PO killers; it prevents one 2d block from yielding a second one. It's not negative against PO either, just kind of less useful; after all, if you want the PO'er to have to follow, just don't use SF. It's an excellent Beast skill; my MB-heavy Orcs with no PO (yet) beat a Nurgle team earlier this week in a game I pretty much owned... after I pushed the BON twice to generate better blocks. Then, I line-blocked the BON, followed, and STlossed him on a foul that broke AV exactly. Had the BON had Stand Firm and Guard instead of Guard and Multiblock, he would have not only won the game, but kept his job in the process.

Against AG, SF in multiples can be huge, especially if you accompany it with something to keep the formations in front of the offense. A Block/SF/ST4 player can maintain the inside picket like nobody else. MA4 sucks for this, I must say; with Orcs I do it using a mix of BOBs and Blitzers, but Pests are a skill behind the Orc Blitzer and not nearly as tough. One trick I really like for this (and have not at all put the pieces together for) is Frenzy/Stand Firm; Frenzy lets you redirect a player and get yourself in front of him, and Stand Firm keeps you from getting blocked away.

But that's about incorporating Stand Firm into a killer build, not using it as the key skill in a dedicated stymie build. If I were going for a Smeborg-style stymie build with Nurgle, I'd take SF as a #2 skill only on 2x Warriors. The other two would take Guard after Block. For defensive use against Claw teams, I'd put Rotters up on the LOS and use the SFNWs to defend and/or expand a partial (303) spine-screen, leaving the back 5 as safeties (BON, Guard Warrior, Pests) ready to deploy in response. Stand Firm is great in that case, because you can't push them out of range.

Yeah, maybe I'm defending at 8 guys, but what team doesn't have that problem? The SF guys are fine; you'd have to be nuts (or get a great kick) to PO on a blitz, and even if you did, you'd find yourself running up an assist (BM) or two (CD) to throw 25/54 for that juicy hit? And SF is great for defense when you're down numbers, because every SF'er is one half a guy who doesn't have to play coverage. Against a lighter team, I'd use the SF'ers and Guarders as midfields and line-ends, respectively. Against high-ST teams without Claw, or against Pact-like teams that have to dedicate MB-only players to slugging it out against BOBs, the SF can maybe go to the line.

I think if you're going to develop your NWs as islands, you have to maintain a steady supply of Rotters, probably meaning at least a 14-man squad, and you have to build three Pests for defense and be ready to bench one on D unless a Pest or Warrior (or Beast) gets hurt. This really favors the one handler and three killers strategy, probably letting you build three MB Pests, two with Claws, and one of those with PO. You also can get away with MB as a third skill on one each of the Guard and SF Warriors, the others getting SF and Tents, respectively.

[Carnis]

I keep hearing this "against a team like that" stuff. That's kind of the point of the stymie style. When you're playing in a format with a dominant composition, you have to build to that composition. When you're not, you have to build against many different opponents.

..Long post..

That still does not help us at all in how does the SF actually fair against PO? I agree, it's a useful skill but PO is so much better I'm inclined to go FEND as the #1 positioning skill and its not high on my priorities either.. SF only after tents and/or guard really..

[mattgslater]

The key to SF vs. PO is to win the matchup battle. SF on the LOS vs. a PO team is not very smart, unless your LOS is so strong your opponent can't 2d any given player; in that case, it's fine so long as you have Block. Vs. PO, SF is best deployed on the edges of your backfield formation, in an area the opponent isn't tempted to leave prone players. One advantage of SF against PO is that positioning skills can reduce the opponent's mobility, making it harder to get the POMBers on your key players. Then all you need is for the SF'ers themselves to survive. In the context of a game, that's usually not a problem unless you get really unlucky; in the context of a season, it depends on the mix you see.

As far as the relative value of Fend, it depends a lot on local factors. In a league driven by POMBers, Fend is better than it is in a league with a lighter mix, or in shorter league. In fact, I've played whole seasons in our seasonal league where no team has taken Fend on any player; in that same league, SF is very popular and PO tends to be limited to 1-2x per team. After all, MB/PO without Claw isn't great vs. AV9; it's 10/36 to pen without PO, and another 260/1296 (reduces to 65/324) to pen with PO, yielding a total 155/324, or 47.9%. That's 47.9% of the 55.6% chance of a knockdown on the 83.3% chance of not hearing that "Eeww!" sound. In short, maybe x maybe x probably = probably not.

[Carnis]

The key to SF vs. PO is to win the matchup battle. SF on the LOS vs. a PO team is not very smart, unless your LOS is so strong your opponent can't 2d any given player; in that case, it's fine so long as you have Block. Vs. PO, SF is best deployed on the edges of your backfield formation, in an area the opponent isn't tempted to leave prone players. One advantage of SF against PO is that positioning skills can reduce the opponent's mobility, making it harder to get the POMBers on your key players. Then all you need is for the SF'ers themselves to survive. In the context of a game, that's usually not a problem unless you get really unlucky; in the context of a season, it depends on the mix you see.

As far as the relative value of Fend, it depends a lot on local factors. In a league driven by POMBers, Fend is better than it is in a league with a lighter mix, or in shorter league. In fact, I've played whole seasons in our seasonal league where no team has taken Fend on any player; in that same league, SF is very popular and PO tends to be limited to 1-2x per team. After all, MB/PO without Claw isn't great vs. AV9; it's 10/36 to pen without PO, and another 260/1296 (reduces to 65/324) to pen with PO, yielding a total 155/324, or 47.9%. That's 47.9% of the 55.6% chance of a knockdown on the 83.3% chance of not hearing that "Eeww!" sound. In short, maybe x maybe x probably = probably not.

Why go on about PO alone now, when we are in a nurgle thread discussing clawbomb vs Block/SF/random skill? The chance of a Block/SF NW-player surviving against a MBPOClawer (before rerolls) is:

p = 1-(5/6 (no ewww) * 5/9 (yes pow/pushpow) * 584/1000 (penetrate armor 7 & knockout+ with mbpo)) = 72,96%

That's still 28% chance of leaving the pitch on the first hit.. If you reroll the push it goes up to 46,8% out per block..

[mattgslater]

Quite right. Claw is the key. By PO, I really meant the combo, and I should have been more specific. Certainly, I advocate taking some MB/Claw on any Nurgle team (or any other team that can get it), though Pests skill faster, blitz at the same ST, and aren't as good for plugging holes. Without Claw, MB or even MB/PO becomes very unreliable.

You're not taking SF/Guard (not "random skill": Guard until it competes with MB, or with Tents if you really want to go that way) over MB/Claw for the mirror-match. How many ways can I say that? When you must face Claw-happy Nurgle and Chaos teams with such a team, you have to win the matchup battle, either neutralizing all/most of the Claw, or at least keeping them up on Rotters.

League composition really matters, because Claw is the key. Teams with no Claw (most teams), or with ClawMB players but no reliable mechanism to block at net ST5 (Skaven, Necromantic, sometimes Pact), really get stymied by Stand Firm. Underworld are kind of the exception, at least with Orcs; they go into the game knowing they can't block their way into the clear, and their strategies kind of work around the "stymie" style to some extent. Even so, lots of SF makes it easy to isolate the rats, and all those Horns should allow for plenty of 3d hits on the Gobs, especially in the second half (with Orcs, I have to rely on Tackle or Frenzy, mostly). And Nurgle have massed DP, which is good against a short-action team.

This is part of that rock-paper-scissors. The stymie strategy is paper, the Claw(PO)MB game is scissors, elves/Zons are rock. Necromantic and Chaos Dwarfs are paper and scissors put together.

[Smeborg]

http://fumbbl.com/FUMBBL.php?page=team& ... _id=648175
This is my new team on fumbbl.
As you can see, no TV bloat by going more killy, C-Pomb online and Tackle MB within 16 games.
And a 10/4/2 record in Blackbox, low TV being Nurgle's worst range.

Hi Jimmy. I would expect your team to fare badly against a stymie Nurgle team of similar experience levels.

Stymie Nurgle does well at low TV levels, in my experience.

Your team has only 2 players with Block, and with no positional skills cannot easily protect the ball-carrier from Wrestle Pestigors. Accordingly, I would expect your offense to be weak. I know you and others (e.g. Carnis) like to "play the man", but stymie Nurgle prefer to "play the ball" - it's what they excel at. You are a man down for each player that Piles On against a team built to hunt the ball.

Hope that helps to explain our different points of view.

All the best.

[SunDevil]

Wow. So much defensiveness from some FUMMBLers and some bash-Nurgle coaches.

Play bash Nurgle, play stymie/control Nurgle - it's all good! It has been said over and over that Nurgle can do very well by bashing, yet some coaches are still hammering the control coaches for playing the team that way - it makes no sense, its a waste, whatever - why so defensive?

Play them how you want, just try not to kill other coaches who prefer to coach them differently. Smeborg has been nothing but polite and informative for almost 60 pages of this thread - he does not deserve the venom he's getting from some coaches here.

It isn't an insult when Smeborg says playing without a Wizard alters pretty much everything - I agree. That doesn't make playing 'No Wizard' an inherently flawed form of BB, just different. Relax people!

[Carnis]

Wow. So much defensiveness from some FUMMBLers and some bash-Nurgle coaches.

Play bash Nurgle, play stymie/control Nurgle - it's all good! It has been said over and over that Nurgle can do very well by bashing, yet some coaches are still hammering the control coaches for playing the team that way - it makes no sense, its a waste, whatever - why so defensive?

Because in fumbbl, we see those kinds of builds get killed over and over again, while losing.. It's mindnumbing to think that it should work splendid in another environment without some major coaching skill/league related issue. Yet the argument keeps coming that its the optimal way to play nurgle - well it's not.

[mattgslater]

It's mindnumbing to think that it should work splendid in another environment without some major coaching skill/league related issue.

Emphasis mine. "League related issues" are inescapable in BB: league format has strategy/development implications that can sharply impact the range of viable builds. FUMBBL in particular (esp. the 'Box) is unusually hostile to "stymie" play and unusually friendly to "slayer" play.

1) Every league has its own culture. In many open/perpetual TT leagues, "slayer" builds just make it hard to find opponents. Why waste hours of your life playing a boring-or-traumatic game if you can play a fun, strategic game against a build that makes both coaches think more? This factor does not exist at all in Blackbox, and while it does exist in Ranked, it's diminished because the time investment per match is greatly reduced. Sometimes, this has to do with perceived coaching skills; perhaps veterans, or at least the better ones, are discouraged from playing certain styles (ahem) to help retain new arrivals.

2) TT leagues usually have a limited composition, and the factors in the league composition are often reflexive. For instance, the TT league I play in has only one AV9 team and two AV8 teams, and is otherwise almost all AV7, making Claw suboptimal. In fact, one coach only plays Wood and Pro Elves, and two only play Skaven, out of eight coaches in the league. In turn, there aren't many Chaotic teams (bar Skaven), and as a result, the AV8-9 teams have both gone for stymie builds. Also, it seems we have nobody who likes Dwarfs or Chaos Dwarfs, making Dodge even more dominant. Stymie > Slayer when Blodge is all over the place.

3) TT games take careful scheduling and require about twice as much time as their FUMBBL counterparts. It's almost impossible in some scheduled TT leagues to establish the whole Block/Claw/MB/PO combo, and getting even just the first three pieces can be quite the feat. It's easier in perpetual leagues, but it can still take months to get that far. By contrast, you can build an effective elf team in just a few games, and an effective (vs. elves) stymie team in a similar period.

4) TT leagues usually have only one or a few representatives of any given skill level, unless they've had a long period of continuity, where there's often a "pack" in the middle, with the newbies and the guys who just don't get it at the bottom and one or two guys with a standout talent (blocking, administration, or spatial reasoning) at the top. Often, there's one team or coach who is dominant, and opposing teams build either to take on that one top team, or to let those games (that game?) go and go after the reflexive builders. This may easily suggest a playstyle to a coach.

That's not all. You probably play TT with people you know in RL, and there's a major social aspect. In my case, I live in a vacation town. We get 300+ days of sunshine every year: the Sun is shining, the beach and parks beckon, rent is totally out of line with wages, there's all sorts of attractions, and the girls are numerous, educated and hot. You could be working for spare cash, or body-surfing, or frisbee golfing, or whatever. If you're going to play board games in such an environment, they had better be fun! Consequently, if you get a reputation for playing to kill the other guy's team rather than to outscore your opponent, it'll not just get you uninvited to play BB. It'll also cost you your RPG and your drinking buddies, and you'll have to go game on the Marine base with the idiot jarhead powergamers (hope you like 40k and don't mind swallowing teeth over rules disputes!). Fortunately, there's plenty of other stuff to do.

[Jimmy Fantastic]

In relation to the last post this is why I complemented Smeborg on his post a while back, he hit the nail on the head.
He wants to make a "fun" team that he and his opponent enjoy playing a game with.
It's a TT league which means the quality of opponents is probably much much less than on FUMBBL and nearly any build would be successful for the top player.
I played a TT league recently and destroyed everyone with POMB Orcs.
I enjoyed it but I imagine not too many others did and sure that's not good for TT BB.

BUTTTTTT

In no way are these "stymie" builds that are advocated in this thread more effective than standard builds.
In no way are they more faster to build.
In no way are they more effective vs Wizards.
The optimal way to play Nurgle is with "slayer" build, and it is optimal under all circumstances for winning the match, although as several people have alluded to it is not optimal for your opponent having fun.

[SunDevil]

Because in fumbbl, we see those kinds of builds get killed over and over again, while losing.. It's mindnumbing to think that it should work splendid in another environment without some major coaching skill/league related issue. Yet the argument keeps coming that its the optimal way to play nurgle - well it's not.

Isn't almost every teams performance heavily influenced by 'coaching skill'? Are you saying FUMMBL coaches aren't good enough to play stymie Nurgle? I know you are not, just seeking clarification. I don't think stymie Nurgle should be penalized if it is seen as something only coaches with some skill can pull off. That implies that slayer Nurgle takes less skill and I KNOW that is not what you are saying.

'Optimal' is an opinion. In FUMMBL, it looks like slayer Nurgle is the way to go. I have no problem with that. In smeborg's local league and my own, stymie Nurgle does well. Both schools of thought have value, neither is inherently better than the other except when you factor in what that individual coach considers 'optimal'.

Because what is 'optimal' is also entirely subjective. In your cases and some others (and please correct me if I'm wrong), it seems 'optimal' simply means raw winning percentage. In other cases, mine and smeborg's included, 'optimal' in this case (of stymie Nurgle) means providing a different coaching experience and challenging ourselves to coach outside of our normal confort zone. For me personally, bashing the boots off my opponent is right in my wheelhouse so I coach stymie Nurgle to improve as a coach and try something completely opposite of what I am nornmally comfortable with. I have no MiB, PO, Claw or DP on my team (except for the Beast's MiB) and am really enjoying the challenge. I've lost some tough games but also won more than my share as well.

Unlike Jimmy F. , I have read this entire thread and I cannot find where bash Nurgle is said to be sub-optimal in terms of onfield winning percentage. I said on the podcast and here that slayer Nurgle will probably win more games in certain leagues/contexts.

Coaches sometime look for different experiences when coaching and stymie Nurgle provides that. They can play (and win) games in a way few, if any, other teams can. Is that the ONLY way anyone should ever play Nurgle? I don't think so, but that is only my opinion. I think it's preferable only because it is so unique and other teams bash just as well, if not better, than Nurgle. Again, only my opinion. I would never begrudge any coach from playing any team the way they want.

On that note, I'm considering an all-Zombie Undead build in an upcoming season...

[SunDevil]

The optimal way to play Nurgle is with "slayer" build, and it is optimal under all circumstances for winning the match, although as several people have alluded to it is not optimal for your opponent having fun.

Optimal does not always mean winning. How can you make such a blanket statement about every Blood Bowl match in every league, tournament, exhibition, online, computer, whatever match in the entire world? "Under all circumstances?" That is an impossibility.

Even when viewing 'optimal' through such a narrow lens as to only mean winning, that isn't even true. I, for one, can attest to winning games by just screwing over my opponent's dice and positioning, using the stymie build. I frankly would not have won trying to kill the opponent, even with the same level of slayer development instead of stymie development. I would have killed a few players (Elves in this case) while the others ran past me and beat me 3-1 or something. They'd have such a lead so soon that they could just run from my slayers for the rest of the game and I'd be too slow to catch up.

"Under all circumstances?" Sorry, man, I had to laugh at that. Play Nurgle however you want and enjoy it. But why this urge to make sure someone is 'wrong' in how they play?

[Jimmy Fantastic]

Unlike Jimmy F. , I have read this entire thread and I cannot find where bash Nurgle is said to be sub-optimal in terms of onfield winning percentage. I said on the podcast and here that slayer Nurgle will probably win more games in certain leagues/contexts.

page 57

Also Carnis, Smeborg has said the purpose of skilling his men up the way he does is to provide fun for him and his opponent and a challenge, not to be the most efficient team so I can understand a lot more of his way of thinking now.

No, Jimmy, I find it to be the highest performing (most effective) style of Nurgle team.

All the best.

For the record I did say that building teams sub optimally is fine is you want a challenge or if you would be ostracized for making a killer team.
I think Nurgle are challenging enough without needing to handicap yourself further.
The title of the thread is Looking for good Nurgle resources/advice, I dont believe taking SF before MB Guard Fend or Claw on any player is good advice if winning is your aim.
Of course if you want to make a fun build then that's fine as I have said before.