Rat_Salat
Joined: Apr 22, 2011
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Apr 26, 2015 - 18:23 |
 
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So, I sort of consider Dwarves a little cheap, especially at low TV. In gamefinder, I tend to decline dwarf teams without even looking at them, rookie coaches or legend notwithstanding. It's not surprising that the only team I have played LESS often in ranked is Amazons, another roster that sits in the "cheap and stupid" section of Rat Salat's opinion of races.
Interestingly, I don't seem to have a half bad record against Dwarves, when I do play them. There was the one game against Azure's Tiny Steel Hammers in the first round of a major where I probably played well enough to win, but made a small positioning error in the second half and watched his god damn skink score 3 times after going up 2-0. Yet, I loathe playing them.
So, in an effort to understand this better, I've played my first six ranked games as Dwarf. We're undefeated at 4-2-0, but each game feels like a bit of an uphill struggle. Some observations:
1) You can blindly offer every match available and still sit without a game. Dwarves don't seem to have any particularly bad matchups at sub 1200tv that I can think of.
2) You're totally screwed if your opponent gets lucky and removes even a couple of your guys. It's even worse than Lizardmen in this respect, you are so slow that being outnumbered is a virtual death sentance.
3) 1D blocking is pretty reliable, and often necessary.
4) Your AV9 and thick skull mean you're going to go up in players most games, even without mighty blow.
5) Guard goes from a "nice to have" on elf teams to "you're dead without it" on dwarves. Some strange skillups in the first few games leave me finally getting my second guard after game 6.
6) Diving tackle as a double on linemen has been a little underwhelming so far. It may become more useful at higher TV. Guard would have been better in the short term, obviously.
7) Not enough people realize that your troll slayers and runners are AV8. Standard Rat Salat strategy against dwarves is to apply mighty blow liberally to those softer targets in hopes of getting a couple of dwarves off the pitch. This hasn't been observed yet, but probably will happen more as the team advances.
8- Scoring with dwarves is HARD. I have yet to walk the length of the pitch in a cage, and most games my runner has to make at least one dodge. Fortunately, AG3 is better at dodging than I recall. This is likely a result of (a) not enough guard and (b) me being bad at teams without ag4
9) People get mad playing dwarves. My opponents seem to enjoy the games far less than when I am stealing the ball with some AG5 elf. Opponents have left games with 0SPP to show for their hour invested, and probably didn't have much fun.
So. Conclusion is that Dwarves thus far DO seem quite easy to play, although I'm sure my positioning could use a little work. Neither myself, nor my opponents seem to have as much fun when I play dwarves. Both points support my hypothesis, but the experiment is ongoing. |
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DukeTyrion
Joined: Feb 18, 2004
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Apr 26, 2015 - 18:29 |
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Dwarves have no plan B, when things go pear shaped, there is no recovering.
They are awesome for getting used to positional play though. |
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licker
Joined: Jul 10, 2009
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Apr 26, 2015 - 18:36 |
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My foray into R with dwarves resulted in a 21/3/2 record and so much mind numbing tedium that I had to stop playing them.
Now I'm 100% sure I picked through those games, so the record is as all R records are, meaningless.
Yet, the lesson is that dwarves are great at winning, but horribly dull to play or to play against. Not as bad as spammed cpomb, because there it's really 100% about the dice rolls, almost nothing to do with actual coaching ability. Still though, once you figure out positioning dwarves just become another grind to play. That's how I look at them, it's like grinding in some dumbass MMO, there's no point, there's little reward, and you always feel like an ass when you're done and realize your time would have been better spent doing literally anything else. |
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bghandras
Joined: Feb 06, 2011
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Apr 26, 2015 - 18:52 |
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My feeling is that this world would be a nicer place without the dwarf roster. Defending them properly is also quite dull. Much work to be done to make sure nothing is accomplished. |
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DukeTyrion
Joined: Feb 18, 2004
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Apr 26, 2015 - 18:52 |
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BTW, I would recommend an edit for point 9, seems a bit name and shame to me. |
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PaddyMick
Joined: Jan 03, 2012
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Apr 26, 2015 - 18:57 |
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You're doing it wrong licker, see Rabe for advice.
Rat_Salat: one way to combat losing a couple of players is to have a bench. It means you keep your deathroller for a full 8 turns as well. |
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Rat_Salat
Joined: Apr 22, 2011
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Apr 26, 2015 - 18:58 |
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Not shaming at all. I know exactly how he feels. Losing two players on turn 1 against dwarves, facing a better skilled coach, and knowing I'm in for 16 turns of boring grind?
No, no shame there. Against site rules perhaps, but that wasn't the point. |
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Rat_Salat
Joined: Apr 22, 2011
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Apr 26, 2015 - 19:03 |
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| PaddyMick wrote: | | Rat_Salat: one way to combat losing a couple of players is to have a bench. It means you keep your deathroller for a full 8 turns as well. |
Sure, you could have a bench, but what's the point? If you went down 3 players in the first half you probably (a) didn't score (b) gave up a defensive touchdown or (c) got scored ON on turn 8.
Either way, the best you can reasonably hope for is a draw. Adding additional 70tv linemen to the bench probably just increases the odds you'll lose the linemen you DO have on the pitch, due to your opponent's min/max 11 player roster having more mighty blow.
No, I'm hardly a dwarf expert after 6 games, but it makes a lot more sense to just assume your AV9 thick skull guys will stick around more than your opponent's do, and do your best in the games you get diced in.
And deathroller? Really? |
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bghandras
Joined: Feb 06, 2011
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Apr 26, 2015 - 19:11 |
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I am experimenting with chaos dwarves (through 5 games), and those are at least a little more speedy, and bench is cheap. I usually keep 1 hobo as 12th body, but I would probably not buy a longbeard for that purpose for 70k. I am not going into details about the deathroller...
With that said I am not having a ton of fun with chaos dwarves. Norse are on the other hand a real blast recently. One way or the other, it is full of action and change. |
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licker
Joined: Jul 10, 2009
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Apr 26, 2015 - 19:14 |
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Dwarfs want a bench, maybe not a huge one, but a bench none the less. |
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Rat_Salat
Joined: Apr 22, 2011
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Apr 26, 2015 - 19:16 |
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Chaos Dwarves are a completely different animal. The presence of 6/3/3/7 linemen, the quasi MA9 bull centaurs and even the Minotaur if you choose to use him give a ton of variety to that particular roster.
Vanilla Dwarves on the other hand have a completely different feel with the 4 ag3 players, everyone getting block, AV9 on all the linemen, etc. |
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bghandras
Joined: Feb 06, 2011
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Apr 26, 2015 - 19:21 |
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Yes, I know, and I agree. My point is really that even the spiced version (cd) of dwarves is ho-hum in the fun department.
Would you really use a Minotaur at CD? |
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Rat_Salat
Joined: Apr 22, 2011
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Apr 26, 2015 - 19:35 |
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I might on a rookie team, just to give that punch in the early games.
I think big guys are a pretty good buy on young rosters, it's when you compare them to the attrition blitzers you can build yourself that they start to be less useful. |
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licker
Joined: Jul 10, 2009
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Apr 26, 2015 - 19:35 |
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CD are awesome fun!
Why?
Because they CPOMB like PROS!!!!
Honestly, I find CD (and skaven to the degree they bash) to be the most 'fair' M access teams. Because they need doubles, so they cannot just spam the kill stack, and their killers are MA4 AG2, so they pretty much blow at anything other than getting scrummed up (skaven blitzers are the bomb of course, but there are only 2). Of course they come with Block and Tackle so that accelerates their kill stack, but then again, they rely almost solely on CAS and MVPs to get there.
More 'balanced' approach to cpomb than Chaos, Pact or Nurgle.
Also, because hobgoblins just flat out suck, yet you need to use them, so you always have this weak link on the pitch, and they tend to get bloaty with skills rather than useful.
What's the weak link on a dwarf team? There isn't one. Blockers are great with just one skill (guard), and blitzers are obviously good, while slayers and runners each fill a useful role on their own. Sure you can poop on the death roller, but no one seriously uses those anyway. |
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Rat_Salat
Joined: Apr 22, 2011
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Apr 26, 2015 - 20:38 |
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The only problem with CDs is that they are so easy to min-max and hover at 1350-1500 TV with an unreasonable amount of bash for the TV level.
When it comes to winning, and being competitive, CDs aren't so bad. Killstack on a ST3 player is less scary to orc/dwarf teams because at least they can guardlock or position to stop the player from being able to apply their beatdown.
The alternative being chaos/nurgle that really hurt a team like dwarves by outstrengthing them while countering their main advantage. |
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Gnomes are trash
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