New Star Player System (Brainstorming)

[Toby]

I was thinking about mixing things up a little,

The System requires a new column on the Team Roster, named "Title".
Consider the Star Players on the Star Player List to have retired long ago...
So the Question now is, who will be "The NEW Griff Oberwald" ?

A coach can permanently hire every Star Player (willing to play) for his team, but only once, unless the player dies or is retired. In addition, you may only have up to four purchased Stars on your Team Roster at a time. The cost to hire the Star Player can be found on the Star Player List. The new Star Player must be given his own unique name, and his position accounts to the teams limit (if there is one) for the position he plays. This also applies for Big Guy Star Players ,they must use one of the teams's Big Guy slots.

The new Star Player is not peaked, so he can gain Star Player Rolls, but suffers from ageing as well. However, not all are titled "Star Players". Some are only "emerging Stars" or even already "Legends".

The appearance fee Star Players charge for playing a match depends on their title. The number of Star Player Points a Player starts with is the minimum required for his title.

Emerging Star's (31) play for 30.000 gp; Star Player's (51) play for 40.000 gp; Super-Star's (76) play for 50.000 gp; Mega-Star's (126) play for 60.000gp; Legend's (176) play for 70.000 gp

Star Player's that advance to the next title charge higher apearance fees as well.

Griff Oberwald (Legend, Blitzer); Mighty Zug (Star Player, Lineman); Jordell Freshbreeze (Mega-Star, Wardancer); Grim Ironjaw (Super-Star, Blitzer); Lord Borak the Despoiler (Mega-Star, Chaos Champion ); The Deathroller (Legend, War Engine)


... what do you think ? What Titles should the Star Players on the Star Player List have to fit them in the System ?

[Thadrin]

I just think this entire idea is bad.
Star players are a horrible unbalancing effect on a league, and appearance fees are impractical under current rules.

God, just THINKING about using stars in anything apart from a one off game makes me feel dirty.

[GalakStarscraper]

Toby,

I'll be honest with you. The best and only permanent Star Player system I would consider would be one proposed a long while ago on this board. Its for leagues where you cannot buy or freeboot stars.

Emerging Star track system:

You may purchase rookie players on your team and for an extra 20k when purchased, put them on a Star track. No player can be on the same Star track and you may only have up to 3 players on Star tracks for your team. Each time this player gets a skill roll, you don't roll for a skill but instead pick one skill or stat increase that progresses the player one step closer to becoming the star. No aging rolls are made for skill/stats earned in this manner. After earning all the attributes, additional Star Player rolls are made as normal with aging. Special Note: if these player has a Stat that is one less than normal, the player earns that stat decrease with the first star roll (as if he had failed an aging roll) ... if he has more than one stat decrease, you'll earn one with each skill roll of your choice.

Example 1: I buy a Human Lineman for 70k and have him on the Zug star track.
For his 1st skill, I give him Block and take -1 AG
For his 2nd skill, I give him +1 ST and take -1 MA
For his 3rd skill, I give him +1 ST and take -1 MA
For his 4th skill, I give him Mighty Blow
For his 5th skill, I give him +1 AV
He will then earn his 6th and 7th skill normally with aging rolls.

Example 2: I buy an Ogre for 140k and put him on the Morg star track.
1st skill: Lose Bonehead
2nd skill: Block
3rd skill: +1 AG
4th skill: +1 MA
5th skill: +1 ST
6th skill: +1 AV
7th skill earned normally with aging.

Example 3: I buy a High Elf Dragon Warrior for 120k and put him on the Prince Moranion track.
1st skill: +1 ST
2nd skill: Dauntless
3rd to 7th skill earned normally ... (under this system I'd actually use Prince Moranion on a High Elf team)

Last example 4: I buy a Dark Elf Lineman for 90k and put him on the Horkon track:
1st skill: Poisoned Dagger
2nd skill: Dodge
3rd skill: Leap
4th skill: Shadowing
5th to 7th skill earned normally

If you wanted to "develop" stars in a 2001 Rules Review environment this is by far the best method I've seen suggested.

Galak

[GalakStarscraper]

Oh and forget any system that uses Appearance Fees. There isn't enough money in the game anymore for Appearance Fees. So any suggested plan for using Appearance Fees won't work under the current rules.

I know I've said this before with your posts and you keep bringing up Appearance Fees ... trust me there isn't enough cash anymore for Appearance Fees.

Galak

[sean newboy]

I actually like that system. Tho personally i would be shocked if u actually ended up with zug at all due to the -1 ag, he would mostly rely on cas spp's and mvp's with the occasional touchdown. He would also have to deal with injuries along the way. But as i say the system would be feasible.

[GalakStarscraper]

I've really thought about using it in the MBBL2 before, but decided we have enough rules without trying to add in the Star Player system and with all the extra teams ... just isn't feasible.

I personally would love this system to be official as it still allows GW to sell the special miniatures for the stars and gives everyone that little bit of hope that someday they might have Griff on their team and they will have built him.

I'm not sure what I'd do with the Deathroller (but its really the only problem). You have to cheat a little bit by allowing Count Luthor to be built from a Wight that you buy for 110k.

1st skill: +1 ST
2nd skill: +1 AG
3rd skill: +1 ST
4th skill: Hypnotic Gaze
5th skill: Dodge
6th skill: +1 AV
7th skill: earned normally

[sean newboy]

Perhaps u could add it to the mbbl next season tho. I agree with the mbbl2, u would have to create alot of new templates for the new teams. Good luck with your flings, by the way had a thot, i dont think flings should have cheerleaders, they should have Waitresses .

[GalakStarscraper]

The only way it would get added to the MBBL is if the BBRC asked to have it tested.

The MBBL charter is very simple ... the rules from the Living Rulebook will be the rules of the league UNLESS the BBRC has requested a rule to be tested in which case that rule will be included.

Currently the MBBL is testing the following 2 rules by BBRC request:

+1 to injury roll for each Niggling Injury a player has

Aging on a bumped up scale (4, 5, 6, 7, 8+, etc rolls) instead of (3, 4, 5, 6, 7+, etc) to avoid aging.

Galak

[Toby]

Galak, very simple answer, there already is more money in the game, using the "A League of their own" Experimental Rules.

You earn 100K to 600K per 15 Games from Sponsoring, and receive 2 D6 winnings. (I would make that 100 to 800 K Sponsoring and 2 D8 Winnings).

Remember your team rating has to be 300+ in order to use that Rules.

Aim is clearly limiting the use of starplayers, and making it useless to use them vs. inferior teams.

Galak, im sorry but the more i read from your ideas of balancing, the less i am changing my opinion on balance. (no flaming!). Simply Banning Starplayers and or rendering them useless is a verry verry cheap approach on balancing. Actually that sucks bigtime.

I edit my 1st Post, pease note the change on Player Positions, further limiting the use Starplayers.

I would like to hear more concrete opinions on my SYSTEM, not just "no its better not to use stars at all".

[GalakStarscraper]

I surrender (almost)

I don't have the Annual yet, can anyone tell me if the Premier League rules are still listed as Experimental.... I would hope they've been moved to House.

I'll give this one more try.

The Premier League rules where written in Blood Bowl Magazine #2. Officially speaking almost anything written in Blood Bowl Magainze #1 or #2, we are supposed to forget ever happened like a bad dream as 99% of the material was dropped or redone with the 2001 Rules Review. Andy wrote the Premier League rules based on 4th edition not the 2001 Rules Review.

Had the 2001 Rules Review existed, Andy would have never wrote the Premier League article that you are discussing Toby. With the new rules, there won't be any more TR 300 teams OR they will be very rare.

What I'm trying to explain is that you are trying to create a new set of rules based on an article written for the wrong edition for a type of team that doesn't exist any more. I'm not trying to flame or disagree with you out of spite. I'm trying to explain that your starting point is invalid. The biggest favor you could do for yourself for suggesting ideas is to forget that BB Mags 1 and 2 were ever printed.

The other issue is that the majority of BB coaches don't like Star Players. You obviously do like the Star Players and want to see more of them. All I was trying to do was suggest a method that Star Players could be added to the 2001 Rules Review environment and for certain stars you'd still be able to develop them further which I think you'd find some support for in the BB community because its mixes in the elements of building your own star and gives an opponent a chance to take the star player out early in his development when he's only at 50% of his potential.

All I'm saying is that if you want Zug on your team and have him able to get 2 to 3 more skill rolls allowing him to be purchased permantently for 120k and then 40k per a match to play won't work with the current rule set because you won't ever reach the TR 300 to use the Premier League rules (even if you found a league willing to use them) and without those rules you'll never have enough gold to afford the star. The majority of the BB community over a year ago requested Star players to be removed or severely limited and the BBRC agreed and did so with the 2001 Rules Review. The only way I see anyone using the 2001 Rules Review to agree to allow permanent star players on a team is the method I showed you. Out of the box purchased stars have a very bad reputation currently.

I can see that my idea of balance and yours are not going to line up. That's fine. I just trying to hopefully help you understand that the game has moved way past BB Mags 1 and 2 and using them as a the basis for any rule means that you are going to be very frustrated on TalkBB since most of us have agreed to forgot that those 2 mags were printed (along with the rest of the online community on other discussion board). .... Other then the Human Pub and Goblin Tribal league rules which are just plain fun for a little something different.

Hope this helps.

Galak

[Toby]

All i took from the XP Rules was Sponsoring and Double winnings. I dont see the heavy impact on Living Rulebook you discibe. Team Rating 300 is just a Number, make it 200 if that would prove to be more playable.

Now since some like Starplayers and some dont, my system has elements of both worlds, and i want to point out that the system i discribed brings stars in the game fairly late. And against equaly good teams resulting in only experienced coaches playing them. It adresses the issue that on a high rated teams, building up a rookie player while playing equal or superior teams is really hard. A Star could fill in the gap for a Dead, or Aging Player.

Additionally i consider Big Guy Star Players using a Teams only Big Guy slot. That enables a coach to for example set up a Treeman Star against an hard-hitting opponents, late in the Team Development. Or one could decide to forge their own Treeman, buing one relatively early. This brings more strategical long term options, and ways to work arround mistakes that you might have made in team management before.

Have you even read my system suggestion completely ? what appart from money and the exact team rating that gives you a sponsoring deal do you consider not to work and or not to be fun to play ?

[High & Mighty]

In your system, you wouldn't be able to have >300 and <300 TR teams in the same league. Once you're over 300 TR in your system, you are then subject to increased earnings (2D8 instead of 1D6; average 30k per game sponsorship vs. 0k).

In addition to adding star players on your team, which will replace that 4 SPP lineman you have or that block, guard, mighty blow blitzer with 2 nigglers and a -1 movement, giving you an instant boost, any death on your roster could be easily replaced with that massive cash flow you have coming in so once you are +300, competitive games would no longer be possible with those below you.

If your plans are to allow all teams in your league to have sponsorship deals and roll 2d8 winnings irregardless of what their TR is and think that if everyone has this cash flow, the problem will be solved, you run into the winnings table. Any starting team with 9 FF (the max you can start with) which earns 2d8 earnings even without any sponsorship will quickly hit a wall. You'll fill up your 16 man roster very quickly and then you'll have massive cash flowing in with two options:

1) either freeboot alot, in which case, you may never make it to 300, or
2) don't freeboot and hoard the cash (since you can't hire any more players) and get to TR300 so you can hire stars full time (and you'll have plenty of cash in reserves to pay appearance fees for a long time to come.

Option 2 would be the only sensible option for a coach to follow because of the massive advantages to be gained once you hit 300 so you end up not playing bloodbowl but monopoly when everyone's goal is simply to make as much money as possible and be as thrifty as possible. So you get to 300 with a rating inflated by cash but with players who are highly undeveloped since you got to 300 so fast and not because of SPPs but gold so after 300, your rosters are logicaly going to be dominated with every star player you can hire and whatever schlubs from your original team you still had a spot for. (Could you imagine an orc team under this plan? Ugly.)

Competitiveness aside, what would you do to your mechanics with teams teetering on the edge of TR300? If you are at 301 and hire a star player but then you have a lineman die in the next game and you go down to 296, do you have to unhire the start player? Assumin the hoarding of cash above, a team that gets to 300 and then starts hiring star players and paying out their appearance fees every game will possibly have a declining TR with some poor winnings rolls and low sponsorship luck so this could very well happen.

The elegance with the current rules is that there are not different rules set up that apply to only certain groups of people or certain team ratings. It's a smooth system in which nothing is explicitly forbidden, but over time, it's just not likely to happen as you start to feel the squeeze. Once you introduce double standards, that elegance and functionality and competitiveness is lost at which point, why would you play the game anymore.

[Toby]

A coach can permanently hire every Star Player (willing to play) for his team, but only once, unless the player dies or is retired.

A Human Team Could buy one Griff, one Zug, and one Morg. No more. In Addition, if you pick Griff, you can only have 3 more normal Blitzers.

As to "Rookie" and "Premier League" teams in one League, you can choose to upgrade your Team to a Premier League Team once you reach A CERTAIN TEAMRATING THAT MAKES SENSE.

I don's see any reason why a Team rating 300 team should play a Team Rating 100 Team at ALL.

While your Team is a Premier League Team, special Rules like Sponsoring apply, and you can only play against other premier League Teams. If you CHOOSE not to upgrade, you don't get for example sponsored as well. You can even downgrade to a normal team, if you declare a Bankrupcy. You are allowed to spend all of your money, then have to scratch your remaining treasury completely and cut your Team Re-rolls in half, rounding down any fractions. Additionaly any purchased Star Players leave your Team.

How about that ?

[GalakStarscraper]

All i took from the XP Rules was Sponsoring and Double winnings. I dont see the heavy impact on Living Rulebook you discibe. Team Rating 300 is just a Number, make it 200 if that would prove to be more playable.

Sponsoring and Double winning are a dramatic change from the LRB. Compare the old winnings table to the new winnings table. The gate bands went from 15k to 20k and now instead of becoming zero, high TR teams can earn negative modifiers to their gold rolls thus allowing them to earn no money at all at the end of a game. The fan factor rules where changed so that high TRs are very difficult to get. The Random Events cards were eliminated which were an incredible source of money.

One of the largest most fundamental changes to Blood Bowl by the Living Rule Book is the massive restriction of cash flow. In order for your star player rules to work, you have to add in the increased cash basically completing reversing one of the changes in the new version of the game that was very widely praised by the BB community.

i want to point out that the system i discribed brings stars in the game fairly late. And against equaly good teams resulting in only experienced coaches playing them.

When Jervis Johnson created the BBRC he gave them one primary mission (I know this from running one of the 2001 RR test league), make it so that a Blood Bowl team can be play forever and still be in a league with rookie teams. So what you are suggesting with this rule set is to reverse JJ primary direction for the game by creating two tiers of teams.

Have you even read my system suggestion completely ? what appart from money and the exact team rating that gives you a sponsoring deal do you consider not to work and or not to be fun to play ?

Now that's not fair Toby ... I read your post throughly and I'm responding to your topics in a very matter of fact manner. The rules you are suggesting reverse three of the major directions of Blood Bowl ... decreased winnings, teams can play forever in the same league, and reduced use of Star Players. All I've tried to do is help you understand this.

Look, a lot happened over the last year. GW was very, very involved in changing the game and you missed out on all that development work, the explanations of why it was being changed, and the emails and posts multiple forums by JJ and the BBRC about the new direction for the game. All I've tried to do help you catch up over what you've missed in the last year and half. I think you believe that I'm just attacking your ideas out of spite without giving them a second thought which is very far from the truth. As DW said before, I'm trying as eloquently as I can to give you honest answers to your suggestions, but all my answers are going to be based in an LRB with the knowledge that I have of where the game is headed to guide those answers.

Galak

[GalakStarscraper]

I don's see any reason why a Team rating 300 team should play a Team Rating 100 Team at ALL.

The problem is that most leagues don't have enough coaches to have seperate tiers.

And if you do have enough coaches, then the overhead on the commish to run a two tier league is a serious pain. If you have a commish in your league who wants the headache more power to him. Most commishes that I've talked to have enough headaches with one tier.

Don't take my word for this one ... guys without getting sucked into the star player debate how about it.

Anthony_TBBF runs the TBBF
Deathwing runs the Woodell League
Dangerous Dave runs the RABBL
and there are several other commishes on this forum of major BB leagues.

If you guys are reading this thread can you give your quick two cents on two tier leagues.

Galak