Talk Fantasy Football

Hi all,
I've been working on a Brettonia team for several years now, and with the playtest results and feedback gathered in the MBBL, the team is now done.

This entire thread is a discussion about a previous version. But as other threads link to this thread - I just wanted to edit this post to reflect where we ended up.

0-16 Linemen 40K 6327 fend G
0-4 Yeomen 70K 6338 wrestle GS
0-4 Blitzers 120K 8338 block, dauntless, catch GS
60K reroll. Apoth. No big guy.
Read more here:
http://home.worldonline.dk/nyskes/bbowl ... nnians.htm

>
Now back to the old team/thread:

In case you don'tknow the team, it looks as follows:
0-16 linemen 40K 6337 loner GA
0-2 yeomen 60K 6337 sure hands GP
0-2 squires 70K 6338 wrestle GS
0-2 runners 100K 7338 block, catch GS
0-2 blitzers 120K 6339 block, dauntless, juggernaut GS
No big guy. 50K Rerolls.

Now, IMO, 2 issues remain.
1) Some have said that it is weird that the squires are AV8, when some of the nobles are also AV7. Personally I think it is OK for them to be armoured like a human lineman, but I'd like to know what you think about that.

2) The team was originally designed with Guard on the squires - because they shouldbe skilled in helping out their leiges. But, to be "better safe than sorry", we gave them wrestle instead, before unleashing them in the MBBL. Playtest has shown that the team is by no means overly powerful, so I'm considering switching back to guard - but perhaps wrestle is the better choice?

Thanks in advance
Cheers
Martin

Where's the "Squires should be AV8, and I'm fine with Wrestle" option? (Not that I'd have voted that way.)

Where is the Bretonnians suck option? I know you don't care ... but you are only skewing your own data by not including it.

Joe

Why have all the linemen got Loner? This is very tough. Also shouldn't there be knights with dauntless and stand firm as it seems to fit their code more?

Interesting...my major issues with this roster:

1) NO Loner on Linemen. Just no. Vampire Thralls would hardly be well trained either, yet they don't have Loner.

2) Linemen have GA access? That's an over-compensation for Loner.

3) Don't even think of putting Guard on starting players - it's far too good on a rookie team.

4) Yeomen + Squires = one too many positions. Necros have the same, but they're different races playing together. A human team has no such excuse. One needs to go - one position can go up to 0-4 (maybe Runners?). Squires seem to serve no purpose other than as eventual Guarders, so they'd be my choice to go.

5) Runners and Blitzers both seem one skill over-described. They are few and expensive for what they do., though.

6) What new playstyle does this roster really bring to the table? This issue effects other proposed rosters too, so it's not unique to the Brets.
A Human team with no Catchers would look very similar and perform better anyway.

Hi all,
thanks for your votes - keep 'em coming

As for the comments:
@Darkson:
Perhaps not the best wording or number of options. I suggest that anyone who think that the squires must be AV8 vote option 1 or 2, and then explain in the thread.

@Joemanji:
I promise that I have enough IQ to know that voting here doesn't equate to liking the team.
And I'm painfully aware that you personally do not like it.
I left the option out because I find it utterly pointless to tack on to every poll about the Brettonians (or indeed every poll, period).

If you think that Brettonians suck, then that doesn't prevent you (the generic you) from having an opinion about this issue. And in the hypothetical situation that your commish added the team to your league, even though you hate it, there might be a possible version that you'd hate less.

@Tritex:
The blitzers and the runners are the knights - or rather the nobles. I've used standard BB titles for these because knightly titles seem to bother some people (see below).
So you'll note that some of the knights do have "dauntless". They could have had stand firm too, but if I had to include every skill that could be concieved as knightly, then the players would become heavily overdescribed.

@Ironage_Man
I hope that you see that I'm trying to give honest replies to your objections, rather than just shrugging them off.

1) I've done polling on TBB in the past about whether a statline weaker than 6337 would still be percieved as human. The majority said yes, so that's what I'm sticking to.
The loner is to show that they are not just underlings like thralls, but that the feudal hierarchy at the core of the team (and culture) means that the nobles don't practice with the linemen.

2) The AG access isn't my idea. But it works fine in playtest. Without it, the linemen would probably have to be 30K - which they were in the past, and that caused (theorybowl) claims of abuse and brokenness. So it got changed.

3) Guard is powerful, but not powerful enough to break every team imaginable. I hope you agree. We've had some playtest with guard, and it worked out fine. Also, the team has a win percentage around 48 in the MBBL, which puts it smack in the middle of the power pyramid. If the squires lose wrestle and a point of AV, then I'm certain that they would have lost as much as they have gained from guard.

4) You're not the first to say that the team has too many positions, or that they should only have 1 specially named position.
About the 1st issue - that 5 positions are too many - I think it is worth noting that in LRB5, there are 6 such teams, so that is certainly not a big deal.
About the 2nd issue, it is true that 2 special positions is a rare thing on mono-race teams. But not unheard of.
Even though LRB5 deleted this from the high elf, dwarf and skaven team lists, it also added it to the dark elf team list - so I figure that it is OK if there is a reason for it.

And there is.
The first is the fluff:
It is at the very core of the team fluff that the team is a feudal hierarchy, and that each noble is served by his personal squire/yeoman, and as the nobles have different tasks, so do their helpers.

Secondly - the team balance:
If the squires and yeomen are merged into a single 0-4 position, then it would either mean that the team would have 8 players with access to S-skills (which some have suggested would be too much), or that the team would have 4 "throwers" which others have reported that they certainly don't like.

So, to me, yeoman + squire is the lesser of 2 evils.
We used to call them Runner's Squire and Blitzer's Squire, to use just 1 kind of special title, but some have found that to be cludgey, or simply found that an apostrophe is an ugly thing. That is why I went with yeoman + squire.

5) I don't find them over-described at all.With moderate statlines on the team, and only few players with 2 or 3 skills, I think that your criteria for overdescription are very harsh. And any fewer skills, and the teams performance would drop even further.

6) I'm glad you ask what new they bring to the table. A playtester in the MBBL wrote the following comment:
"I've now tried playing with all the experimental rosters on MBBL (except as Slann) and I find that the Brettonian roster is quite possibly the best of the bunch in terms of game balance. It's not a roster that's as competitive as the tier 1 teams, but you can certainly win games with them.

More important than all of that, this is a roster that's pretty fun and unique to play: I've found Brettonians' to have a distinctive 'screen' running game that's not cagey, certainly not bashy and not something I would try with normal humans (having linemen that are no better than your journeymen is actually quite liberating)"

IMO, they bring a special screen running game, which with low AV, low ST and unreliable linemen can not be cage-based, but has to be more spread out.
A charge based offense with a substandard defense.
And - of course - it brings Brettonians to the game, which fans of that particular species might like

Thanks all
Martin

Joemanji wrote:Where is the Bretonnians suck option? I know you don't care ... but you are only skewing your own data by not including it.

Joe

Second vote.

Hi Xtreme,
like I said to Joe:
If you think that Brettonians suck, then that doesn't prevent you (the generic you) from having an opinion about this issue. And in the hypothetical situation that your commish added the team to your league, even though you hate it, there might be a possible version that you'd hate less.

But if I did such a poll, I guess I'd need 2 options:
* I don't want Brettonians in BB, Brettonians suck.
*I do want Brettonians in BB, just not your version. Your version sucks.

Perhaps some other time.
Cheers
Martin

well said Martin.

I personally would not object to an addition that seem to be (after testing) balanced and interesting without being a killer or a wimp.

Saying "that sucks!" whilst sometimes fun is just plain rude in this instance.

If even 2 people wanted to have bretonians then it would be worthwhile to have this discussion, and the fact that 2 really don't want it is fine too, however like I do with special play cards they should just close their eyes and avoid the thread.....

Instead of Loner, why not have 6 3 3 7 linos, and have skills on the better players like...

Dislike: This skill represents a player's tendency to distrust any
players that aren't part of his race. When a player with this
Negative skill wishes to Hand-Off or Pass the ball to a player that
isn't part of his race, roll a D6, on a 1-3, the player refuses to give
up the ball; otherwise he may Pass or Hand-Off as normal. He
may Hand-Off or Pass to members of the same race without
penalty

Distrust: This player will play alongside any other player type,
but if a ball carrier that is on their team, from a different race
finishes their action beside them, then the player with Distrust
must roll a D6. On a roll of 2+ nothing happens, but on a roll of
one, the player tries to rip the ball of his team-mate for fear of
him doing something stupid! The player must then roll for a
catch roll and a fumble is a turnover.

Obviously they need rewording, but its a suggestion anyway... feel free to disregard it

Brownrob.

the answer I'm sure plasmoid will be along to verify, is that Loner is already an accepted skill described in the LRB 5.0.

Adding either of these two skills might "work" and maybe more fluffy or "correct" representations of the class dislikes.

BUT, the goal here was to not invent extra rules to make the team. The team is designed to slide right into the LRB 5.0 with no rules impacts.

I could certainly argue that asking for a "variance upon the 4 positionals limit" is a lot less disruptive than making people learn new skills. Especially ones that are only for 1 team. (IE the goal was to avoid doing what the Vampires and Blood Lust did.)

plasmoid wrote:
But if I did such a poll, I guess I'd need 2 options:
* I don't want Brettonians in BB, Brettonians suck.
*I do want Brettonians in BB, just not your version. Your version sucks.

I missed this second poll. I like the first option in it.

plasmoid wrote: @Ironage_Man
I hope that you see that I'm trying to give honest replies to your objections, rather than just shrugging them off.

I've no problem with your explanations, they seem sincere to me.

I will say my first three objections are more serious than my last three - I'm not sure those linemen would ever receive the official stamp of approval - they certainly make the team one of those 'not for noobs' rosters.

4 players with P access I don't think is a problem - it's not like any of them would be any good as throwers, requiring so many additonal skills. Leader might get taken, but skills like NoS are hardly scary on Ag3 players with such average movement.

It is my opinion that most rosters introduced to the game from here on will have some new skill or rule to give them some unique flavour (like Decay on the new version of the Rotters), so Rob's Dislike/Distrust negaskills aren't completely out of the question.

Just to be clear, I'm hating the linos, and I'm not thrilled by the Squires.

Iron Age. I see you point, and understand the validity.

I just dis agree that new teams need thier own "new" mechanic.

I think there are plenty of existing mechanics that have not been utilized yet. And for the record I'm not talking about a 6 3 3 7 sure hands base team or something along those lines. I'm talking more along the leaping Slann idea.

And personally I think it is an easier sell to new leagues and especially new players to not introduce yet another skill to the game. Especially if it will be then be Extrordinary.

Mad Jackal wrote:Iron Age. I see you point, and understand the validity.

I just dis agree that new teams need thier own "new" mechanic.

I think there are plenty of existing mechanics that have not been utilized yet. And for the record I'm not talking about a 6 3 3 7 sure hands base team or something along those lines. I'm talking more along the leaping Slann idea.

I agree - that's why I used the proviso 'most' (the Slann also came to my mind when I wrote that - they're the most original no-special-rules-needed roster since the Lizardmen). We haven't seen a team with Ag3, A and M access, or a team with Str 4 players with P access, or stunty teams with a mutation (or mutation access). The main difficulty is fluff compliance - I created a viable Feral team with a unique playstyle a while back, but it had no fluff to fall back on, so I let it go.

The way teams are designed is you choose a race from the WH universe, then you make up a roster that fits the fluff (more or less). There are few left to be given a BB roster, and of those, many would need a special rule like Bloodlust or Decay to give them a new angle - otherwise, you'd just be churning out variants of existing rosters. I very much doubt more than four more rosters will ever be added to the game, unless GW adds some new races like they did with the Khemri and Lizardmen. If BB wasn't tied to the WH universe, we could just go crazy with new ideas.