DreadBall - The Futuristic Sports Game

[Overhamsteren]

Thanks for the reply, so far I have only played one off games and I can see most of the usefulness of jacks come from developed jacks/teams.

So far all the teams I have played with/against have 8 starting players so 'cheap' jacks don't seem to do much for starting teams. Orx and Goblins the basic team most dependant on jacks also seems to be doing the worst.

http://db.chezalex.net/official.html

Maybe for one off games some house rule could be in order.

[daloonieshaman]

I rock with the O&G
Jacks are awesome one just needs to learn how to use them as Jacks

[Overhamsteren]

Jacks are awesome one just needs to learn how to use them as Jacks

So you use your goblins for something that one wouldn't do with a normal striker?

[Smeborg]

Thanks for the reply, so far I have only played one off games and I can see most of the usefulness of jacks come from developed jacks/teams.

So far all the teams I have played with/against have 8 starting players so 'cheap' jacks don't seem to do much for starting teams. Orx and Goblins the basic team most dependant on jacks also seems to be doing the worst.

http://db.chezalex.net/official.html

Maybe for one off games some house rule could be in order.

Overhamsteren - if you are playing lots of one-off games, I suggest you would benefit by playing tourney rules, at say TR120 or (recommended) TR130. That is to say, starting teams at TR100 plus 30 points of TR which you can spend on anything you like (including skills at 5 points per skill, roll randomly on the selected table). I like to level the playing field by making sure every team has an offensive coach (highly favourable to Jacks) and at least 1 card (I find teams at a disadvantage if they have no cards). Some teams will like to buy an extra player (e.g. the Girls and the Z'zor will buy their second Guard).

Hope that helps.

[Smeborg]

I rock with the O&G
Jacks are awesome one just needs to learn how to use them as Jacks

Gobbos rock in DB. Their Speed of 3+ protects them just enough, and helps greatly with Dashing and Evading. With the heavy-hiting Orx to complement them, they come into their own. Offensive coach definitely needed first, though.

The other Jacks which rock for me are on the Z'zor team. Well-protected by CFaT, more importantly their Slide means they can do cheeky things such as Running Interference at a distance, Throwing a Strike or making a Slam when the opponent does not expect it. I like to use them as ball-handlers in preference to the Strikers (who have their uses, just not as primary ball carriers).

All the best.

[Dzerards]

One of my core rules of thumb is that you need to be getting a strike attempt away every rush.

In my experience it is vanishingly unlikely that you will be able to retain possession of the ball during your opponents rush; denying them a scoring chance.

My experience of using Z'zor without starting the Strikers has been a frustrating one in this regard.

[Smeborg]

One of my core rules of thumb is that you need to be getting a strike attempt away every rush.

In my experience it is vanishingly unlikely that you will be able to retain possession of the ball during your opponents rush; denying them a scoring chance.

My experience of using Z'zor without starting the Strikers has been a frustrating one in this regard.

Mine has been almost the opposite - I am really frustrated by having to use Strikers with 5+ Skill. Of course you really need an Offensive Coach for the Jacks to be able to score easily.

All the best.

[Overhamsteren]

Yeah Z'zor seems to have some good jacks, or maybe just decent jacks and then most other teams have crap jacks.

As for offensive coaches, aren't they a must for any team really? Getting an extra action on your striker just makes getting that solid strike so much more likely especially if you miss a double on a pick up or some such. It's just great insurance to be able to use an extra action on the same player.

As for Running Interference, it's 3 cards in 52, right? How many cards do you usually get in a game?(starting+bought with actions) Taking that average number of cards what is the chance of getting a Run Interference card? Seems a bit small to me if I had to guess at the probabilities.

Only seen Run Inteference once in 7 games but gotta admit it stopped a possible 3pts strike in that game. If I remember correctly the human jack took down a goblin which was a little lucky but I can definitely see how blocking a path can stop a strike, often a striker is already doing one or two dashes to get the 3 pointer and then having to do extra dashes on top of that becomes super risky. (and the evades add a little more risk)

[Dzerards]

I have been primarily running Veer-myn so the 5+ skill issue doesn't worry me as much. It probably explains my shot a rush prime rule as they miss about 30%. Though that is countered by coaching dice and their ability to reliably go for 3 pointers.

Our league didn't allow coaches this season (it started before season 2 had been released), so I don't have first hand experience with them, but from what I've seen of the tournament scene, their impact on strikers is much greater than jacks.

As for RI, if it was such a game changer, I'd expect the girls to be doing much better than the boys. The tempo advantages of cards and less jacks seems to trump mass RI. (Though the corporation W/L ratio maybe artificially high due to the amount of games played against Orx).

Jacks have both dice penalties and tempo penalties compared to guards and strikers and at their current cost just don't cut it.

[Dzerards]

The crux of my dislike of Jacks in their current form is mainly the tempo issues.

A Jack will typically take two actions to do what a guard or striker could do in one. Plus the jack typically has one less dice to do it with. Mainly they are used passively to increase the number of threat hexes or block of strike hexes, but a guard or striker is still better at these roles as they have one more dice to dodge or slamback with, enabling to stay in the way longer.

Offensive coaches can enable a team to help the jacks out with their tempo problems, but as they can also be used on strikers and guards, who are more efficient with their actions, it will rarely make sense to favour a jack (unless you don't have a striker or guard to hand).

The last issue is with cards. Having jacks means that a card drawn is always going to be useful. But I get the feeling that the main purpose of drawing cards is so one player (usually a striker) can attempt three actions in a turn (or to get the ball shatters card). At the cost of an action token (which is effectively an any player/any action card) to buy a card of unknown usage (which in my case is usually stomp or sucker punch), card buying is always a gamble. Having Jacks in the side to increase the expected return from card buying is a solid case for their inclusion, but then so is maximising action token usage in each rush. Random event cards seem to replace each other so quickly with all the ref moves, random player selections and fan checks that their worth as a drawn card is marginal at best.

Running a Veer-myn team I haven't missed them at all and just ask a Judwan coach if he is losing sleep over not having jacks!

[Overhamsteren]

Actually thinking about it these past days maybe my problem with jacks was the way the creators of the game heralded their versatility as such a strong point and playing (one off games with the 4 basic teams) I found them to be very lacking. Maybe my expectations caused undue disappointment.

This is probably paraphrasing Smeborg with great creativity but if the creators had just said: Being a jack sucks, your team's reliance on jacks is part of their style - having jacks should give some bonus elsewhere, jacks do have some extra potential when skilling up and future teams will have stronger jacks due to individual stat profiles and special rules.

Then maybe I would have understood jacks better.

As someone said to me; Human Corp's 4+ isn't average - it's pretty damn good considering they have both strikers and guards, and starting with 2 cards is great, with these advantages I guess having to field some jacks is just good balancing actually.

I still think Orx and Goblins seem to have too many jacks and not enough bonuses but the Z'Zor look very interesting.

[Smeborg]

Yeah Z'zor seems to have some good jacks, or maybe just decent jacks and then most other teams have crap jacks.

As for Running Interference, it's 3 cards in 52, right? How many cards do you usually get in a game?(starting+bought with actions) Taking that average number of cards what is the chance of getting a Run Interference card? Seems a bit small to me if I had to guess at the probabilities.

The Z'zor Jacks are still a bit hit or miss, I feel. But in general, any Jack which starts with something (St 3+, Speed 3+ or a skill - 2 skills in the case of the Z'zor) is quite decent, each have their own flavour. I am inclined to agree that bland Jacks without anything extra at the start (e.g. Humans) are a bit crap.

Unless I've missed something, there are 10 cards in the deck allowing you to Run Interference (the rules say that RI is "not a normal Action", but I take this to imply that it is still an Action, otherwise I would expect the wording to be: "RI is not an Action"):

Jack: Run Interference
Jack: Any Action
Any Player: Any Action

That's quite a lot. It's not uncommon for me in practice games to have a team draw 2 or 3 RI cards over the course of a game.

All the best.

[Overhamsteren]

That is indeed a very important rules distinction, I've asked on the mantic forums.

[Corvidius]

Just had an intro game on Wednesday. Lost, but it was interesting noting what I needed to train out of my brain from Blood Bowl.

[Overhamsteren]

So seems only Jacks with the Ability Running Interference can Run Interference with the Any Action Cards. http://quirkworthy.com/2012/11/03/livin ... ment-37216

Guess for me it's still more options that I thought there where previously and does make Female Corp more interesting with their Jacks and 4 cards.