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MenonaLoco



Joined: Jan 05, 2016

Post   Posted: Jun 25, 2019 - 06:15 Reply with quote Back to top

Garion, i got the ag3 on the small guys from your comparison with lizardmen. Ok, i understand you just say they are similar composition wise, but these little guys are not even half-skinks. And theyr guard to gang up doesn't work with str1, except every now and then. Usually they are just easily removed and then the team is in trouble.

But forget about that. You got that covered: worse teams will be played less. ok. But think of Ka-Sabar and all the other bones, bash teams, slow teams in SL. There are more fun teams in their own niche now.

Guard is by definition ganging up? Gang fouling not so much? Each to his own opinion, ok. DP would give the little dudes a clear identity, task, and maybe a way to help a bit more before being removed - and that's almost a guarantee. They will be removed almost every game at some point.
Garion



Joined: Aug 19, 2009

Post   Posted: Jun 25, 2019 - 07:57 Reply with quote Back to top

Arktoris wrote:
well, it's your private league. Enjoy.

Secret League was a super idea. The one and only thing that got in the way, was the owner's ADHD need to mess with rosters.

Seeing the "lock" on teams is promising. time will tell if that holds.


Wow... pretty rude and entitled. Just because you don't like some thing changing does not make this attitude ok.

I've spent hundreds if not thousands of hours on secret league and putting this all together. Changes to rosters have only happened on 3 occasions since the launch in early 2016. Based on feedback, statistical analysis of open and private leagues and a trusted group of people that have tested these rosters substantially with whom I can bounce stuff off. To achieve greater balance among other reasons etc..the changes have also been very minor for the most part. With handful of exceptions. Which isn't much considering there are 100 rosters. The lock is being put on some team pages now, because generally I don't want to be making any changes to the rosters now unless warranted. So "locked" teams will not be changed going forward, with each year I am closer to finalising all the rosters. The only thing that could ever change this is of blood bowl core rules substantially change resulting in rebalancing. But I can't see that happening.

Finally- you are being very opinionated about this roster (which is fine) but you haven't played with them. Give them a try and you might find them better than you think. Personally I think they are a decent race. As Gary eludes to they are just slow starters.

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Garion



Joined: Aug 19, 2009

Post   Posted: Jun 25, 2019 - 08:07 Reply with quote Back to top

delusional wrote:
Unless Monstrous mouth does something really cool, that is one bloaty big guy.

Defensively your plaguebearers are going to have to be good at keeping the line, clearly the nurglings cannot. Imagine this would play like a slow Lizardman team.

0-1 Great Unclean One 200,000 3 6 1 10 Loner, Bone Head, Regeneration, Thick Skull, Disturbing Presence, Foul Appearance, Mighty Blow, Nurgle's Rot, Stand Firm, Monstrous Mouth, Throw Team Mate S GAP


Correct, all the greater daemons are very bloaty, this was done intentionally. Also all of the daemon teams are tier 2 other than slaanesh. The rest perform around the same level.

Monsterous Mouth - Is the same as having catch, and sure hands without the rr for pick ups. Not very useful, but a fluff starting skill. E.g. In a ruck the ball bounces around players lands on the GUO and disappears in to the gaping maw in its stomach. Which no one wants to attempt to retrieve. That sort of idea.

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Garion



Joined: Aug 19, 2009

Post   Posted: Jun 25, 2019 - 08:16 Reply with quote Back to top

MenonaLoco wrote:

Guard is by definition ganging up? Gang fouling not so much? Each to his own opinion, ok. DP would give the little dudes a clear identity, task, and maybe a way to help a bit more before being removed - and that's almost a guarantee. They will be removed almost every game at some point.


I think maybe you miss understood the point. Gang Up was a skill in blood bowl in 2nd edition. It is also a skill Nurglings have/had in other GW games. Esentially that skill works as follows - Each Nurlgling in base contact adds their strength together as if they are 1 creature. So 3 nurlgings would be St3 and so on. Translated to modern blood bowl this is Guard. As for them being removed every game, yeah I would expect so too, though really you only need to get to half time then you can get your reserves on, they are so cheap getting a full bench isnt hard. They just need to do their job to maxamise 3d blocks all over the pitch, and get the occasional hit in themselves, and generally be pests.

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Garion



Joined: Aug 19, 2009

Post   Posted: Jun 25, 2019 - 08:47 Reply with quote Back to top

In the last 2 years (slightly less to be precise) DoN have played 303 games in the Open division (more in private leagues), with a win percentage of 45.87%. which puts them in tier 1.5 to 2.
Daemons of Malal have played the least with only 86 games in the same period and a win percentage of 43.%. In fact to make it easier here is a little table -

Code:

Daemons of Khorne     556   42.99   
Daemons of Malal      86    42.44   
Daemons of Nurgle     303   45.87   
Daemons of Slaanesh   575   53.74   
Daemons of Tzeentch   373   44.1


Thats games played and win percentage in the last 2 years. (its actually slightly under 2 years, but thats splitting hairs)

So in terms of tiers this would go -
Daemons of Khorne tier 2
Daemons of Malal tier 2
Daemons of Nurgle border line tier 1.5 to 2
Daemons of Slaanesh tier 1
Daemons of Tzeentch border line tier 1.5 to 2

so all performing as expected, in the tiers they were designed to be in. When looking at private scheduled leagues the stats are much the same.

DoN are currently averaging about 3 games a month at the moment in SLO. More if you could scheduled private leagues.

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Rigolgm



Joined: Sep 14, 2018

Post   Posted: Jun 25, 2019 - 09:04 Reply with quote Back to top

Garion wrote:

What's your league format? Is it table top? How many games etc..


In my case, we tend to have short leagues of about 6 matches (1 vs each opponent, for 0, 1 or 3 points) but can carry on the team onto the next league, continuing its development. It feels like Daemons of Nurgle would have trouble doing ok for the first league or two. Opponents tend to include Underworld, Lizardmen, orcs etc.

And thanks for all the information!! Great stuff. I'm pretty experienced with getting the most out of Snotlings (aka Grots) in my Ogre team, so look forward to using Nurglings. Although Nurglings are much worse at dodging so I fear I won't be able to get them out of melee half as often, so it'll be interesting to see how fast they die. At least they won't frequently be left standing next to Boneheading Ogres who fail to hit opponents away, like my Snotlings are.

I'm guessing the usual nemesis of Titchy players will work vs Daemons of Nurgle, namely Ag4 Dodge players who can run through/past/around Titchy players almost like they aren't there (making Diving Tackle a desperate, maybe TV-bloaty consideration). It's a nightmare. Against that, sometimes you need to do the '2-1 grind' tactic by letting a first touchdown happen fast ... but it's not ideal with a team that's this slow.
Garion



Joined: Aug 19, 2009

Post   Posted: Jun 25, 2019 - 11:05 Reply with quote Back to top

Hmm, well if you are playing against Lizardmen and Orcs, these will be very tough match ups as these are both high end tier 1 teams and you are using a tier 2 team essentially. As you mention, if you continue with your team from one season to the next then they will improve over time. The start is the hardest because your important players are so expensive.

So you can either go for 2 rrs, and all your plaguebearers or start with 3 rrs and then buy your final Plaguebearer, I would personally go for 3 rrs 5 Plaguebearers.

In terms of play style some of the comments are spot on in their assessment that this team has similarities to Khemri, most notably is the high Strength but lack of skills situation. As with Khemri just because you have the strength advantage in some situations does not mean you should block all the time. Sometimes it is best to just try and make life as difficult for your opponent as possible and try and make them roll a lot of dice, make them hit you, slow their progress to a crawl. Try and grind out 1-0 wins.

When picking the ball up shield your player from the opposition, you should only need to make this 50% roll once in your drive, so make sure you have a enough protection to give your nominated ball carrier at least 2 turns to make the pick up, and try not to waste an early re-roll unless you have no other choice.

put your MVPs on your plague bearers every time early on, get some block Sure Hands and a break tackle quick. Your nominated carrier (the player you give sure hands to) will skill up easily and quickly to their 3rd skills, the others will need a little more luck, mvp and a cas to get that all important Block.

Ultimately playing with this team is going to be a challenge and you will need to be very organised in your approach. If you have to take a big risk every now and then that is ok though. Its only a 6 sided dice at the end of the day Smile

I think all this talk has inspired me to start a new DoN team too Very Happy

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MenonaLoco



Joined: Jan 05, 2016

Post   Posted: Jun 25, 2019 - 17:35 Reply with quote Back to top

Thanks for explaining the gang up - thing. I am sure it's in the racionale too. I read those usually, i think i didn't read all the stuff about the DON team. So, yeah, this makes sense.

A small advice: i wouldn't call Arktoris' comment "entitled" or anything, it's one of many valuable opinions, he is participating in the discussion and he is actually playing SL (not just cherry picking, for example), so, i don't see anything wrong about him offering his opinion. Yeah, may sound rude for somebody who invested as much time in this as you, but still, i don't see a reason to disqualify his criticism just like that. IMHO.

I mean, why should DON be such a challenge while Slaanesh breaks the game, with ag4 hypno spam without nega trait? Why can't Nurglings be just a tiny bit better, like, faster, or av+, or something? While they can't mutate, why can't the great unclean one have tents? You know it would be fun. Or why must there be the exact same structure as lizardmen, why not going the new fling route and say, ok, most nurglings are normal, but 0-2 can be "evil stinkers" and have dp instead of guard. You know it would still be a way worse roster than Slaanesh. SL is the place to try out stuff and do some crazy things. Why not try something more fun here and there, without making a tier jump?
ArrestedDevelopment



Joined: Sep 14, 2015

Post   Posted: Jun 25, 2019 - 18:35 Reply with quote Back to top

FWIW DoN seem to perform absolutely fine in CIBBL, ie. a format without picking and a scheduled structure.

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Garion



Joined: Aug 19, 2009

Post   Posted: Jun 25, 2019 - 18:58 Reply with quote Back to top

MenonaLoco wrote:
Thanks for explaining the gang up - thing. I am sure it's in the racionale too. I read those usually, i think i didn't read all the stuff about the DON team. So, yeah, this makes sense.

A small advice: i wouldn't call Arktoris' comment "entitled" or anything, it's one of many valuable opinions, he is participating in the discussion and he is actually playing SL (not just cherry picking, for example), so, i don't see anything wrong about him offering his opinion. Yeah, may sound rude for somebody who invested as much time in this as you, but still, i don't see a reason to disqualify his criticism just like that. IMHO.


I'm fine with people having opinions and voicing them, my critique of the attitude displayed was specifically in reference to the single quoted post, in which I was called ADHD (which is not true) and the general tone of that message. However I hold no grudges or anything like that, and I am always happy to listen peoples thoughts, and discuss them. I don't have to come here and explain the rationale of things or discuss this stuff with people, but I do because its good for people to know they are heard. Equally I believe if people ask then rationale should be explained in more depth. But when I disagree with them I shouldn't be insulted even if it is a minor dig. Anyway, lets not have this become an issue for anyone, I've always enjoyed playing, spectating and listening to Arktoris' opinions and will continue to do so. Smile

MenonaLoco wrote:
I mean, why should DON be such a challenge while Slaanesh breaks the game,


It's statements like this that bug me tbh, because its actually incorrect. Sure on paper DoS look very good, but anyone that has played them will confirm they are far trickier than they seem. Again their win percentage is in line with what I would expect a tier 1 team 53.74%. FYI this is lower than - Amazon, Skaven, Elf, Lizardmen, Wood Elf, Chaos Dwarf and Dark Elf. They are also not performing particularly well in scheduled leagues, or any of the tournaments we run.

Now to answer your more balanced and fair critique -

MenonaLoco wrote:
I mean, why should DON be such a challenge... (you then go on to suggest a number of potential changes)


So all the Daemon teams were designed to be around tier 2 to tier 1.5. This was my goal for them. I wanted them to be bloaty and not particularly adept at playing the game with the exception of Slaanesh (more on this later). As the stats show they are performing at the level I wanted so I really do not see a need for changing them. I have also been trying to limit the changes I make to teams as much as I can, whilst still trying to achieve the correct balance. Some people really dislike the rosters changing at all. Others like you are happy to see things change over time.

Now back to the daemons and why I want them to perform at the level they are, now this is hard to explain in limited forum space, but I will give it a go... Basically the design principles of all of Secret League teams is to make sure the rosters are as close the background material as they can possibly be. Both the Blood Bowl official history and then the warhammer world background from 3rd edition up to pre end times. which is where Blood Bowl has always drawn its inspiration from, so I do not want to invent any new creatures, everything in SL is based on the source material.

So basically with the chaos teams we have the warriors of chaos teams for their respective gods, Nurgle, Slaanesh, Khorne and Tzeentch. These teams are the more traditional and more internally balanced roster builds with 4 Chaos Warriors aligned to their gods, 4 Gors with god specific attributes, and then special linemen and possibly big guys that are alligned to their gods. The daemon teams are very exaggerated versions of the thematics you see in these teams. Khorne - collecting skulls at the expense of winning, Nurgle - spreading its rot and its anti blood bowl tactics, Tzeentch - using magic and unusual mind bending tactics, slaanesh - Pleasure and pain in equal measure and the persuit of perfection.

To daemons playing Blood Bowl I always felt they should be lower than tier 1 teams because they are all so fanatical in persuing their themes and ensuring their teams play in their image, at the expense of being a well rounded team. E.G. DoK - kills stuff and barely have any time for the ball and so on. Now the reason Slaanesh are the only Daemon team to be tier 1 is because they are all about perfection in their background material, and so when playing blood bowl, they need to cause pain, and receive pain, and also to play the perfect game all of which excites and pleases Slaanesh, on top of all that their stat line is fast and highly agile which is always going to be good in BB.

Now as the stats show the teams are performing in the desired tiers already, so I see no reason to make any changes, especially when it upsets some people. There have also been some pretty good teams in leagues over the years and nurgle get better at mid to higher tvs. I agree it is hard to start off with for them though.

I think the problem for some people is the tier system its self really. Most of the "Official" teams are tier 1 (some people make an extra tier known as S which includes the very top 3 or 4 tier 1 teams, but thats for another thread). Then you have 3 or 4 tier 1.5 teams, 1 or 2 tier 2 teams, and 3 tier 3 teams.

Now with secret league you have around 100 teams, about 20 ish tier 1 teams. Then about 40 tier 1.5 teams. 30 tier 2 teams, then about 10 tier 3 teams. These aren't exact numbers, but one of the goals of SL was to incraease the number of lower tier teams, as there are so few in the normal game. Some people like the tiers in the game, some people want all teams to be much closer together in terms of their ability. And some people like me ( and the official Blood Bowl game designers also explicitly state this in the rulebook) love the 4 tier Blood Bowl system. It gives you a challenge if you want a challenge, or if you want to play a really great team, swap to wood elf or avelorn, if you are a masochist play with Ogres and so on. Smile

Hope this all makes sense, it was a long train of thought.

phew..

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Garion



Joined: Aug 19, 2009

Post   Posted: Jun 25, 2019 - 19:01 Reply with quote Back to top

ArrestedDevelopment wrote:
FWIW DoN seem to perform absolutely fine in CIBBL, ie. a format without picking and a scheduled structure.


here are two examples of what AD is talking about -

https://fumbbl.com/p/team?op=view&team_id=880378
https://fumbbl.com/p/team?op=view&team_id=912043

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MenonaLoco



Joined: Jan 05, 2016

Post   Posted: Jun 26, 2019 - 00:05 Reply with quote Back to top

Thanks, yeah, that actually makes a lot of sense. Btw. i hae fun with my DON team, it's not about tier complaining. Thanks for your long answer. Now, where to talk about fun stuff like the dp nurglings and such ideas? Smile
pokrjax



Joined: Dec 01, 2014

Post   Posted: Jun 26, 2019 - 00:24 Reply with quote Back to top

Arktoris wrote:
well, it's your private league. Enjoy.

Secret League was a super idea. The one and only thing that got in the way, was the owner's ADHD need to mess with rosters.

Seeing the "lock" on teams is promising. time will tell if that holds.



Very uncool.


For what it's worth I really enjoyed playing DoN and hope to go back to them and SL in general if and when I have the time.
delusional



Joined: Jan 18, 2013

Post   Posted: Jun 26, 2019 - 03:49 Reply with quote Back to top

Garion wrote:
delusional wrote:
Unless Monstrous mouth does something really cool, that is one bloaty big guy.

Defensively your plaguebearers are going to have to be good at keeping the line, clearly the nurglings cannot. Imagine this would play like a slow Lizardman team.

0-1 Great Unclean One 200,000 3 6 1 10 Loner, Bone Head, Regeneration, Thick Skull, Disturbing Presence, Foul Appearance, Mighty Blow, Nurgle's Rot, Stand Firm, Monstrous Mouth, Throw Team Mate S GAP


Correct, all the greater daemons are very bloaty, this was done intentionally. Also all of the daemon teams are tier 2 other than slaanesh. The rest perform around the same level.

Monsterous Mouth - Is the same as having catch, and sure hands without the rr for pick ups. Not very useful, but a fluff starting skill. E.g. In a ruck the ball bounces around players lands on the GUO and disappears in to the gaping maw in its stomach. Which no one wants to attempt to retrieve. That sort of idea.


Ah so Catch but with protection against strip ball?

Curious about the blood bowl rules re eaten balls. Does the player have to move to the end of the field, do they have to poop the ball out or is a stomach contained ball good enough. If a Snotling eats the ball, does the player then become the ball? Can the ball be stripped/beaten out of their belly or poop'd out?
Weresquid



Joined: Mar 25, 2016

Post   Posted: Jun 26, 2019 - 04:00 Reply with quote Back to top

The skill literally works like catch, and protects from strip ball. There are no special rules about eating balls, the ball is held in the same way that any player can after a successful pickup or catch.

In BIBBL I play slaanesh daemons who started a few games after the DoN, and I have a 1/1/1 record against them. Ive also played developed DoN in open a few times, with varying success. Maybe Im a terrible coach, and it’s obviously a limited sample, but they seem fine to me.
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