A revolutionary new concept

[Mestari]

Mestari : Your defending 12 team rule could be good with many team, but with elf, I use to start a team with eleven players, so it will be real handicap for elf at the beginning, isn't it ?

A good argument. Really can't say anything to counter that.

[DoubleSkulls]

Taking it that I disagree with the point of changing the balance I'd argue the following changes:

• Limit the use of TRR's on offence Maybe something like you have to make a 4+ roll to be able to use one this action (so you can fail to use it for something, but if its not a TO you can still try again later).
• Give the kicking team a free blitz Since the receiving team knows that a blitz is coming its much easier to set up defensively.
• More Kickoff results to favour the kicking team Make bad kick "precise kick" so you can choose to reroll the scatter direction. Reverse quick snap so the kicking team move 1 square. That's over a quarter of kickoffs now favouring the kicker instead of the receiver.

[Furelli]

This whole offence/defence issue seems silly. My beef with it is "if the defence manage to get the ball from the opponent, don't they now have a massive advantage?"
I like the limiting team re-rolls as a possibility if this balance had to be readdress but it should be while your opponent is in possesion of the ball.

Furelli

[neoliminal]

It's a simple fact of probabilities that offense is more likely to be succesfull than defense.

Or do you deny that? And if you do, on what grounds?

As that is my problem. The fact that it's more likely to score on offense than on defense.

Actually the best coaches score repeatedly on defense, having only one offensive drive per game. If anything, offense should have the upper hand.

Protecting the ball is harder than attacking it.

[Munkey]

If you often play games where it is easy to score and harder to defend, and I would have to disagree that all games are like that, then the game will often be won on defence.

For example if two elf teams are having a touchdown shootout, the one that stops the other scoring on one of the attempts will be the winner.

The other thing to consider is that although you do not have the initiative on defence if you manage to get possesion then you have taken the other teams advantage in recieving.

[Bevan]

I'm not sure whether we need to even up defence and offense, but the simplest method would be to make the receiving team set up, then the defending team sets up knowing where they'll be.

This gives no further advantages after the ball is kicked off, as would be the case with 12 players, reroll limits etc. so there is no carry over effect once the kicking team has stolen the ball.

[Ithilkir]

Or once per half/game, the defensive team (defined by the team currently trying to take the ball away from a team that does have the ball), is allowed to call "The Blitz!", and for that turn only, they may make any amount of blitzes.

Rough idea

[Mestari]

Might as well reveal my secret agenda:

I'm having a real-time object-oriented programming course next spring, and thought I'd make a football game as a programming practice (I'm not yet sure if I'm allowed to choose my own topic) - with players, referees, crowd etc. as threaded objects with soft real-time rquirements.

However, I have no intention of replicating BB, so I've been toying around with different ideas on what kind of a game to make.
However, as the game mechanics are going to be somewhat similar to BB (there has to be blocking, throwing etc.) I wanted to know how you think that 12 players would effect BB. The reason for considering 12 players is mainly that because I'm realistic about the level of AI I am able to develop for the purpose, I'm anticipating that the offense might be better off.

If I can do that as the course exercise and if I succeed, I'll let you know

[Zombie]

So you really are a Deranged Finn!



For everyone else, that's an inside, you can't get it.

[Mestari]

But apparently the people in there have already become bored with the discussion - I assume it's because they cannot counter my arguments

[Zombie]

No, don't worry about them, they can counter all right. It's just that the discussion had been going on in there long before you arrived (like months), so almost everything has been said already and they're tired of repeating.

[Marcus]

Hey, I actually got the deranged finn reference (Damn Hillbillies)

My problem with your whole concept, Mestari, is that it's supposed to be harder on defence than on offence. It can be argued that the purpose of the game is to break the advantage and create the gap in the scoreline - like breaking serve in tennis.

Once you have scored, you kick the ball to the opponent and surrender advantage to them, it keeps the game in balance. If you favour the defensive side then you are left with a situation where the kicking team kicks, turns the opponent over scores, kicks, rinse, repeat. There is no way back into the game when you're on the end of this cycle.

Reductio Ad Absurdum - if you were able to always score when on defence but never scored when on offence you would still never lose a game. Why? Because every time you score you kick the ball again and are back on defence. This is why I always build my teams with an eye to aggressive, turnover defence.

The slight imbalance between offence and defence is there for a reason and, in my opinion, it's what the game is all about.

[Grumbledook]

Thats what i try as well, my skaven with a dauntless gutter runner often surprise a thrower left unguarded after the kickoff, or at least put tz on him, and my bull centaurs are great at turning the ball over, can't wait till he get break tackle to complement the blodge.

[Mestari]

A good one Marcus. I hadn't thought of that. I have to consider my work-in-progress game from that perspective too.

[voyagers_uk]

I'm with Marcus, in so much that I play defence and score more that way. I try to set-up in such a way that I can collapse my line around the opposition and beat them like weevils until they give me the ball and ask me to go away.

It is a common tactic in my league to slow the offence to a crawl and pick away. This though is a weakness on offence as only one coach is successfull at scoring fast TD's. Defence is the focus here.

I used to concentrate on scoring and found that I was doing well with Dark Elves to cause the turnovers mentioned before. Now that I play Dwarves it is a lot easier to do this. I have just played a 4 game local season and conceded 1 TD now I am off to the quarter-finals to do this again.

I like the splurge of ideas to "Balance" this divide, but think that this would be better done in tactical guides for experienced coaches (more than 10 games less than 40) rather than any kind of handicap.

good luck with your project.