Warpstone Avengers

[Vaehnin]

On 6/20/2019 at 11:16 AM, Borke said:

Anyway, how will our heroes do against this lot? Not going to lie, it'll be tough.

 

You give me way too much credit. This is the third time our teams meet and I have yet to even manage a draw against you. 

[Borke]

1 minute ago, Vaehnin said:

 

You give me way too much credit. This is the third time our teams meet and I have yet to even manage a draw against you. 

 

I'm managing expectations - mostly my own

[Mongloom]

I am pretty excited for the avengers season start!! They will kill all those claw guys, I can feel it!!!

[Borke]

On 6/28/2019 at 7:47 AM, Mongloom said:

I am pretty excited for the avengers season start!! They will kill all those claw guys, I can feel it!!!

 

Well, the first match was against a non-claw team, and I didn't kill any of them, so: Prediction came true so far???

 

Anyway, first match is done, and it was a 1-2 loss. Vaehnin played a great match, using his advantages (lots of Guard, annyoing DT player, multiple Tackle players) to great effect to put me under a lot of pressure, and I couldn't pull off the miracle plays. The fact that I had to burn rerolls on two double skulls also hurt me a lot (both times with Dr. Weevil, which is especially painful, as that's the one block roll I cannot use Pro on). Without that, I might have gone up 2-0 in the first half.

 

Vaehnin also remarked that I could have stalled longer before going up 1-0, and it's true, I had at least one more turn of stalling in me, maybe more. However, I would have had to expose Dr. Weevil to MB blocks in order to keep up the stall, and I wasn't willing to do that, especially since I had wizard and Dribblesnot to try and steal the ball again in the first half (which I managed, but couldn't convert the 2-0 score due to a failed 1 in 6 dodge).

 

Fortunately the match didn't cause too much attrition. A 6 SPP Two Heads Gobbo died, and yeah, they're nice to have and don't grow on trees, but I can live with that. No other permanent injuries, not even any MNGs.

 

Next match is the big one, then, against RTSD's super-Nurgle. Remember how I said he might kill everyone else in the division? Well, one example already happened: Black Exes, Hudd's Chaos team, went from 2020 TV to 1340 TV - two deaths, two stat decreases (which might or might not lead to retirements) and an MNG (MNG only on the Minotaur freak). Now it's my turn, and the name of the game will be survival, nothing else. If I come out of this match with most of the team that went in (including Dr. Weevil), I'll be happy.

 

Oh, and we have two levels, both Throwers leveled last match. Normal rolls on both, they both reach 51 SPP, and I'm tempted to simply give Block to the one that doesn't have Block yet, and Extra Arms to the one that doesn't have Extra Arms yet, so that they both have Block/Dodge/Two Heads/Extra Arms.

[C2MC]

Mr.Borke: "Alright, our only option is a Throw Team-Mate play for the draw!"

*Troll gets injured on the opposing Turn 16 and doesn't Regenerate*

Mr.Borke:

Edited July 2, 2019 by C2MC

[Borke]

Very true, @C2MC!

 

To Vaehnin's credit, though, he was aggressively targeting my one-turn scoring options, both the MA7 Gobbo and the Troll. No doubt that, if the Troll hadn't been injured on the block already, he'd have thrown a foul right after.

 

In the end, this gave me the opportunity to make a turn 16 foul and score another point for the Dirty Git competition, so everyone is a winner!

[Borke]

I still need to report on the brutal match that was our meeting with RTSD.

 

The first half was actually quite successful. We chose to receive, and while we didn't really accomplish many (important) removals against the Nurglings, we didn't suffer many, either, and we managed to rather safely run our TD in on our turn 5. This gave RTSD plenty of time to score back, of course, but we had the Wizard, and I figured that trying to run in a regular score in 4 turns might force the Nurgle team into a position that I could then exploit with a fireball or lightning bolt. And that's exactly what happened, the fireball came down, and it allowed us to steal the ball. I had fully intended to actually score and go up 2-0 at that point. However, having to burn rerolls on double skulls and other bad things prior meant that when it came to dodging away the designated scorer for the final turn, I wasn't able to reroll the 1 that inevitably happened. Still, we went into half time up 1-0, I was ecstatic at this point.

 

The second half went much more as expected, though. By which I mean that RTSD was able to bully me as much as he liked, leading to an early score, and then me losing the ball, and then him scoring once more. And since the Troll was out resting by the end, along with most of the team, I wasn't in position to try for a 1TTD on turn 16, either.

 

Still, the 1-2 loss was basically expected, and the only permanent injury we suffered was on the sacrificial Linerat (he already had -MA, now he also has a Niggle and will be replaced). I call that a success any day of the week. Our overall start to the season might not look good at 0-0-2, but it could have been sooooo much worse.

 

Next up: Chaos! It's midievil's team. One Claw/MB Warrior is MNG, but they still have plenty of killing power. So far our record against midievil is 0-1-1, perhaps we can make this our first victory! (one can hope)

[Doomy77]

That’s one of the big scary teams out of the way, huzzah! Now RTSD can go murder all your opposition instead.

[Borke]

Two more matches are in the books for the Avengers, both against Chaos.

 

First, we faced midievil's Horned Harassers. As I wrote in my last post, I considered that match winable, even though it's a rather developed Chaos team, due to him only having two Tacklers, and one Warrior being out for the match. And the match was a good back and forth, a fun match where both sides had opportunities to win - but in the end we made it a 1-1 draw. The most striking feature of the match was probably the incompetent Minotaur. :)

 

The second Chaos match was last night, against TheSir's Inevitable Titans. I felt even more comfortable with this one, because there was only one Tackle player on the team, and he came with Wrestle and no MB. Still 6 other MB players, and 5 of them with Claw, so my Troll and the Blitzers were certainly feeling a bit anxious, but I was optimistic.

 

TheSir chose to receive first. The Chaos army marched down the field, and even though I put up decent resistance (including some nice bombs from Dribblesnot), and the attrition wasn't too high, in the end I could not contest the turn 8 score. Which meant that it was OTT time. We set up for it, but then TheSir got a perfect defense, allowing him to shuffle his players to thwart our efforts. However, he chose to only rearrange his three LOS sacrifices in a slightly less convenient way for us, so the OTT was still possible. More annoyingly, the kick had landed in an awkward place where the Thrower couldn't quite reach the Gobbos at the front line, even with two GFIs. So I had to use the blitz to chain push one of the Beastmen into one of the Gobbos to push them back one space, then clear the Troll of the remaining Beastmen, pick up and hand off the ball with two GFIs, toss the MA7 Gobbo, stick the landing - and check to see that the Gobbo could exactly make it to the end zone with two GFIs, provided he made the three 3+ dodges through no Tackle. The crowd held their breath, and the Gobbo succeeded! I'll be honest, that was such an unlikely play overall, I was as stunned as TheSir. Probably a 2-3% play.

 

With that boost of confidence we went into the second half. The Chaos team had arrived with 12 players only, but they only lost one in the first half, so they still had full team to defend with. On the other hand, I know that The Avengers are a slippery team, especially against (almost) no Tackle, and in the second half they showed that they also have sharp teeth and claws. Dr. Weevil started taking out Chaos players every other turn, and he was helped by our DP Gobbo, who managed two removals of his own without getting caught. All this, combined with a snake eyed GFI early one turn by the Inevitable Titans, meant that the second half wasn't really contested, we basically camped near the Chaos end zone. TheSir made one last attempt with a cage dive by the Wrestle/Tackle/+AG Goat, but the 5+ with reroll didn't work (and even if it had, it would have been tough for him to recover the ball and prevent the score). So on turn 16 we walked in the 2-1, and with 6 players remaining, TheSir didn't really have an option for a OTT.

 

After the match, we were surprised to see the Troll get the MVP, he hadn't done a lot all match - but perhaps not eating the Gobbo on the OTT score was already worthy of the award! In any case, that pushed him to 31 SPP, and would you believe it, this Troll turned out to be The One - the famed Block Troll has arrived! I didn't think it was even possible, we've been through so many Trolls in our two Underworld franchises, but now, finally, we have a Block Troll!

 

I now fully expect @Mongloom to murder him in our next match

[Borke]

Wow, my team blog has slipped down in the list quite a bit! Time to write an update, I suppose.

 

So let's see, the last two matches of last season were a loss (1-2 to Skuld's Lizardmen) and a win (2-1 over Stahlburg's Chaos). The latter match resulted in a few permanents, though. A Two Heads Gobbo was fired for getting niggled, and the ball getter Gobbo (Two Heads, Big Hand, Extra Arm, Sure Hands) also picked up a niggle to go along with his -AV and was finally let go.

 

The new season started badly as well, with us losing the mirror match against PositronMike's Underworld, 1-2. This match was basically lost to me losing a gamble when I positioned my cage too close to Fez, whom PositronMike had hired.

 

On MD2 we faced off against jrpeart's Vampire team, and we managed to get a nice 2-2 out of it (after being down 0-2 to start with). Vampires basically walked all over us at the start, and then we started removing Thralls at an alarming rate, to the point where the Vamps couldn't do anything any more if they rolled a bloodlust (it's been a while since I've been able to force a Vamp team into a corner like that, literally rolling bloodlust and just walking off the pitch, because the one remaining Thrall was not in range).

 

Oh and by the way, even though my last season did not go well at all, and this season has started miserably, I'm having fun, because a) the team hasn't imploded, yet, and b) most of the matches were great, good opponents, nice banter, crazy plays.

 

Speaking of the team, it's in good shape. We're sitting at 1910k TV (30k of which is excess gold), with 14 players. The only permanent injuries are old wounds, like -AV on the MA7/Blodge Gobbo, -MA on one of the Blodge/Two Heads/Extra Arm Throwers, and -MA on the DP/Two Heads/Sure Feet Gobbo. To be honest, the one that I'm feeling the most, out of the above, is the -MA on the Thrower, I like my team to be able to make crazy moves, and he sometimes lags behind. However, the Blodge/Two Heads combo is still too good to replace him.

 

And finally, the best news for the moment, we got ourselves a +AG Gobbo. And it happened on the first level, too, so no useless Two Heads. We look forward to following the career of Hench-Gobbo #31.

[Mongloom]

UW PLAYING FOR THE CHAMPIONSHIP!!!! YOU CAN DO IT!

[Doomy77]

UWD becoming champs would indeed be nice (I can say that now Vamps have a title) but I suspect Nurgle are a big problem.

 

I also wonder if I’m the unfortunate Vamp coach you were reminiscing about. That first encounter in BB1 was so brutal I’ve made sure to beat you like a gong a couple of times since.

[Remthar]

Underworld up in the championship is bloody impressive. As the only race in the game to actually deserve access to Clawpomb I will cheer you on and be looking forward to carnage!

[Borke]

So, two more matches to report on. I'll make this short.

 

MD3 we were up against some Dwarves, and it was, as expected, a very grindy match. In the end we lost 0-1, mostly due to very good defensive play by my opponent, Sampittu.

 

MD4 was against Khuno Tridentis and his Amazons. We brought Dribblesnot for 10k, while the Zons brought Helmut and a bribe. Helmut was very effective, as expected, in the first half, but in the end we were able to break away and score on turn 7. We prevented the counter score, and in the second half a deep kick, combined with excellent play from Dribblesnot slowed down the Zons enough that they were forced into risky plays, allowing us to steal the ball and secure the 1-0.

 

The one fly in the ointment is the fact that Dr. Weevil suffered a -AV on a turn 16 foul. He is now on his way to mirror his idol, Adjudicator Nuts, who terrorized the OCC despite his -AV and a Niggle. It's not too much of a setback, as I'm keeping Dr. Weevil safe most of the time anyway.

[Doomy77]

Nuts was one hell of a player. Good luck with Son of Nuts.

[Borke]

Not much has happened since the last update.

 

Well, two matches happened. But they were both very one-sided affairs. Against Sage's Wood Elves I received a proper nuffling. Lost 1-4. Noone injured, one Wood Elf killed (Lineman with two skills), so I guess it's not all bad. I always expected to lose this match, Wood Elves are simply better than Underworld in every single way. The fact that every cage dive attempt by Sage succeeded on the first try was a little annoying, but what can you do. I still had fun!

 

And then the second match was last night, against Bill-BJJ's Orcs. First of all, I have never had an Orc team induce an Apo against me. Secondly, boy oh boy did Bill-BJJ provoke the ire of Nuffle. The first 4 turns were about even - in fact I was starting to complain that my Claw/MB was doing f- all (4 armor breaks in 21 blocks). But then the Orcs greed rerolled a block into a double skull early in a turn, not only giving me a free stall into a turn 8 TD, but also injuring one of their Tackle/MB Blitzers off in the process. The Orc turn 8 as well as the Orc turn 9 were a symphony of pushes, and then Bomber Dribblesnot happened. In three consecutive turns, he perfectly nailed his bombs, knocking down I believe 8 or 9 players, causing maybe one KO, and in the end also knocking down the ball carrier. The scatter was absolutely perfect for me (bouncing through the last standing player), my Thrower picked it up, secured it, and that was that. We tried to go for another TD, but Bill-BJJ's defensive play was too good at this point, so we settled for securing the 1-0. There was one more moment of excitement when Colonel Warptard tried to eat my +AG Gobbo, but fortunately couldn't find his mouth.

 

In the aftermath, that same +AG Gobbo leveled and now has a Big Hand.

 

Oh and Colonel Warptard is 2 SPP away from his next level. Naturally he hasn't been able to cause a single casualty in the last two matches. On the other hand, his Block has already come up countless times, I am very happy to finally have a Block Troll!

 

Next match: Necros!

[Doomy77]

Bollocks to woodies being better in every way, they're just better at Blood Bowl.

[Remthar]

Sounds like Dribblesnot has been practicing more lately. That, or he's drinking less.

 

Or maybe more, who knows. whatever it is, I'm sure he'll be back to form of blowing himself up first try soon.

[Borke]

Colonel Warptard, my first and only Block Troll in countless seasons playing Underworld, is dead.

 

The end.

[Doomy77]

16 hours ago, Borke said:

Colonel Warptard, my first and only Block Troll in countless seasons playing Underworld, is dead.

 

The end.

 

That's a pity. Chin up! You don't need no stinking Block trolls. 

[Borke]

So, after the disaster last MD, when Colonel Warptard died (he died twice during the match, btw: dead -> apo -> -MA -> regen success -> dead -> regen failed), we had a good MD8, winning 2-1 against Kazman's Dark Elves. We didn't even lose any players in the process.

 

During the match, our Thrower Claw Finger leveled. He's got Blodge/Two Heads/Extra Arm so far. The level is a normal. There are many interesting skills on offer, I feel. I could give him Kick, which we don't have on the team yet, and which can be very useful against slower teams. Another option is Kick-Off Return, making our offensive drives safer against fast teams and increasing the OTT odds. Leader is another possibility, it would either give be a cushion for rerolls, or allow me to drop the team rerolls down to 2 to lower TV. Foul Appearance would add another roll to those sacking attempts. And finally Big Hand would make picking up the ball in traffic (and then dodging away with it) all 2+ rolls with reroll.

 

I'm not sure which way to go and would love to hear opinions.

[Borke]

The Thrower took Kick-Off-Return. I felt like that would give me the most mileage overall, in particular against fast teams (being able to cage up more safely).

 

Our last match of the season was a loos, so we end on 3-1-5 - not my worst season, but bad enough to be relegated again, to tier 3.

 

So far I've automatically been thinking "don't worry, we can promote again from tier 3, just keep on trucking, the team is still looking good". And the team isn't bad, true. I still have 4 great skilled rats, and an AG4 Gobbo. But I also have only 11 players left on the roster, only two skilled Gobbos left, 80k in the bank so I could go back up to 13 players, but I'd be broke. I need to level yet another rookie Troll, since Colonel Warptard died.

 

And worst of all: I think I might finally be tired of Underworld. It's heresy, I know, but I have noticed myself just going through the motions, not thinking creatively any more. And I am so damn tired of every coach I face just employing the tactic of "look, I am basing your whole team with my players, what are you going to do now??". Theoretically I should be able to punish that by abusing my mobility, and by having ClawMB on a few pieces, but my killer has achieved a total of 8 KOs and 8 casualties for the whole season. And that's with me blitzing with him at every opportunity. Last match, for example, he made 10 knockdowns - not a single KO or cas...

 

So I'm really conflicted at the moment. In theory the Warpstone Avengers could still become a great team again in a season or two. They have the potential. But on the other hand I might not be playing them well enough any more, I don't know. It might be time for something different: Necro, Nurgle, Pro Elves, High Elves. Those all appeal to me, for different reasons.

 

I need help deciding, I don't have much time!!!

[Remthar]

I can see the underworld lifestyle becoming draining after a while, at least if your murder blitzer isn't doing his job right. I don't know if switching is right for you or not, but thoughts on the teams:

 

Necro are possibly the only truly competitive hybrid team, they can do a bit of everything except pass, and a handoff to a wolf can get similar distance to pass anyway. They can foul, have regen, can kill with wolves. Really, really want the double for MB on one wolf at least, one of the things that's put me off them is needing that so bad to be the complete package.

 

Nurgle is giving up and becoming part of The Problem. I mean, you're not chaos dwarves, but thats all you have going for you morality wise. You'd also look gross and smell bad, and no I'm not bitter because nurgle killed one of my elves recently, why do you ask? Good for winning the long term. I doubt the OCC will be switching to the theoretical BB3 any time soon, but I imagine you'd want to make sure you were enjoying the journey with the team as well as the destination.

 

Pro and high elves are a matter of taste. Pros have the amazing catchers, advanced blitzers and are the most stylish team in bloodbowl. Glorious elf-plays are the order of the day, and they will have no choice because trying to maintain any kind of bench will not last long. 11 players and loners looks to be the lifestyle.

 

High Elves with AV8 will offer you a chance at a bench. Nuffle will still take it from you while laughing, but there is a chance?  Basically pros have better positionals, High elves can have a few ascended linesmen and at least in theory better survivability. High elves are also a pain for like the first season, no skill and only two rerolls makes every action a stress.

 

Good luck whatever you do!

Edited November 12, 2019 by Remthar

[Borke]

56 minutes ago, Remthar said:

Nurgle is giving up and becoming part of The Problem.

 

DO YOU SEE HOW MUCH KARMA I HAVE BUILT UP???

 

But seriously, I get you. And part of me doesn't want to go the route, exactly for that reason. But I think they can be played in a fun way

[Rymdkejsaren]

I get it. When I felt like that I actually took a break; I was sick of playing my team but I also felt bad abandoning them before either having done something I'm proud of or having totally crashed and burned. But that might not be an option for you.

 

If you feel like playing the team is a drag and rebuilding them wouldn't be fun, then you should probably re-roll.

 

2 hours ago, Borke said:

Nurgle