pac
Joined: Oct 03, 2005
|
  Posted:
Dec 02, 2005 - 13:52 |
 
|
<i>Are you a jaded Blood Bowl coach?</i>
If so, then these <b>Alternate Blood Bowl league rules</b> (for table-top) may be for you:
http://www.friedgold.co.uk/altbbligp.htm
I'm not, for the record, jaded at the moment. The marvel that is fumbbl has restored my enthusiasm for Blood Bowl: ease and speed of play; variety of opponents; ability to run a different team without splashing out on miniatures; and so on. But I don't need to tell anyone here that on-line BB is great …
However, at the start of last year (long before I'd ever heard of fumbbl) I had become somewhat bored with the pattern a new table-top Blood Bowl league always seemed to follow: as an experienced coach, when you start a new team you know what skills you mean to pick, what order you will make purchases in, and so on. On the pitch, every match can be entertaining and different - especially if you have fun opponents to play against - but off it, team development can become repetitive and predictable.
Now, I'm well aware of all the usual remedies for this problem: learn to run an entirely different kind of team; run a team in an unconventional style; run an underpowered team; organise a Stunty, or other unusual, league. These and more are all good options, and I have tried most of them: with the same skeleton of league rules, the same problems tend to resurface.
All this led me to design a heavily-modified set of Blood Bowl league rules: a rule set which attempts to take some of the mayhem and unpredictability which you get on the pitch, and bring it to the process of team development. These don't directly affect the familiar on-pitch rules, but offer a radical alternative in the areas of player recruitment and player and team development.
(Veteran Blood Bowl coaches will note that some of the ideas below draw a lot from the second edition Blood Bowl league rules. This is entirely acknowledged on my part: but while the stuff in second edition was the inspiration for some of my rules, they have come along way from those beginnings.)
Let me explain one thing: the idea of this set of rules is not in any way to compete with, or act as a critique on, the official league rules. The objective of those rules is to establish a level playing-field for on-going leagues, and I think they succeed in doing this as well as is possible for a dice-based game. My rules were designed as an alternative for experienced (and somewhat jaded) Blood Bowl coaches, who would appreciate more variety and unpredictability in the development of their team, as well as perhaps a little of the flavour of real-world sport. The objective of my rules is not fairness at all: in fact every coach using them should frequently if not constantly feel brutally <i>un</i>fairly treated - while understanding that this feeling is all part of the 'fun' of it all …
These rules have been successfully run over the course of one testing league, but certainly still need a lot more work: they should be considered to be 'in beta' for the time being. I have recently updated them to be compatible with the latest PBBL (or Vault) rules (and only those rules for the moment) - so if you aren't yet familiar with those, my rules will probably confuse you even more. 
I'll summarise some of the distinctive points of this system below. Take a look at these before you attempt to wade through the full rules linked above:
• there are three types of players: Rookies; Pros; and Stars
• new players are always Rookies: a Rookie who reaches 6 SPPs will become either a Pro or (if he is lucky) a Star
• Pros will make up the bulk of most teams: they can only ever acquire three advances (always normal skills) and are basically dull but dependable
• a player who becomes a Star will gain a number of advances immediately (and can go on to gain up to seven), which will include a higher proportion of stat increases and double skills than usual, but sometimes also include random skills which the coach cannot select exactly to taste
• Stars also possess Quirks. Quirks are character traits rather than abilities. A few of them are good; more are bad; some are a mixed blessing; and there are one or two which could give a coach nightmares. However skilled a Star may be, if he has too many bad Quirks, he can be more trouble than the rest of the team can carry
• in addition, the more Stars a team has, the more Random Events it will attract before each game. Again, some events are good, but more are bad. A nasty combination of events and Star Quirks can be disastrous for a team
• new players are bought at auction as Rookies. New Rookies have a Star Potential modifier, which affects their chances of becoming a Star later in their career. Rookies with higher Star Potential will naturally attract higher bids
• Stars who are unhappy and/or mismanaged, or who a coach wants to retire, may leave a team, becoming Free Agents or Freebooters, available for permanent or temporary hire by other teams in the league
• players and staff may be traded between teams in a league (though the League Commissioner must monitor all transfers). Special rules apply when a Star changes teams: Fan Factor and other Stars' attitude can be affected
And that's about it: the major stuff anyway.
Anyway, all feedback on these rules is welcomed: I'm not in a table-top league at the moment so I'm in no position to continue testing them myself for the time being. Please feel free to post replies here; to PM me; to contact me via the e-mail address listed in the rules file; or to badger me about them in irc if I'm not looking for a game.
(One disclaimer: I'm eager for all kinds of discussion of these ideas, but I'll be far more interested if someone wants to be thoughtfully critical than if someone just hates the idea of them and wants to dismiss them out of hand. I am well aware that these rules could never suit every coach, and they are not intended to; however, I also hope that there are some coaches here who will like some of my ideas.)
YMMV. |
_________________
Join us in building Blood Bowl Sixth Edition.
In other news, the Hittites are back. Join us in #fumbbl.hi  |
|
Curro
Joined: Jun 07, 2005
|
| Posted:
Dec 02, 2005 - 14:12 |
|
It looks like so complicated. I like BB over warhammer or others miniatures games because of its easiness, and this add too many new rules to the current ones.
On the other hand, this makes BB more like a Roleplaying game, and that´s cool. More Realistic. But we have Rol games...
Nah, a good job, but I don´t like it much. |
|
|
pac
Joined: Oct 03, 2005
|
| Posted:
Dec 02, 2005 - 14:16 |
|
| Curro wrote: | It looks like so complicated. I like BB over warhammer or others miniatures games because of its easiness, and this add too many new rules to the current ones.
On the other hand, this makes BB more like a Roleplaying game, and that´s cool. More Realistic. But we have Rol games...
Nah, a good job, but I don´t like it much. |
Thanks for the feedback. 
I actually find that these rules make life <i>simpler</i> on the pitch. This is because only the Stars have unusual skills and stat increases: and they are generally rare and easy to keep track of. One of the reasons I like these rules is that I'm very bad at keeping track of +ST players.
The (admitted) complexity in these rules is mostly added to players' down-time, not to the time taken to play a match. |
_________________
Join us in building Blood Bowl Sixth Edition.
In other news, the Hittites are back. Join us in #fumbbl.hi |
|
Curro
Joined: Jun 07, 2005
|
| Posted:
Dec 02, 2005 - 14:24 |
|
Uhm.. to be honest I didn´t read the full page (Sorry, but I´m too lazy) so my point of view isn´t so valid.
I guess you must try the rules as homerules, and if it works tell me and I´ll give it a try too. It´s hard to me to play matches in tabletop game (my friends Suck!!), so it´ll be harder to teach them a full brand new pack of rules.
PS.- I´m wondering if this could be a valid (and very good) ruleset for a football (soccer) game... |
|
|
pac
Joined: Oct 03, 2005
|
| Posted:
Dec 02, 2005 - 14:30 |
|
| Curro wrote: | | Uhm.. to be honest I didn´t read the full page (Sorry, but I´m too lazy) so my point of view isn´t so valid. |
That's okay: I didn't think you could've read them all that quickly.
| Curro wrote: | I guess you must try the rules as homerules, and if it works tell me and I´ll give it a try too. It´s hard to me to play matches in tabletop game (my friends Suck!!), so it´ll be harder to teach them a full brand new pack of rules.
PS.- I´m wondering if this could be a valid (and very good) ruleset for a football (soccer) game... |
Yeah: this rule set is basically aimed at groups of experienced (jaded) coaches. We had a couple of rookie coaches in our testing league, and it certainly made their learning curve steeper …
As for a football game: this is only a league rules set - there are no on-pitch rules changes. If you (or someone else) were to write on-pitch rules for Bloodbowl-football, then I expect my league rules set could be adapted to those. Certainly, they give a better feel of being a manager running all of a club's affairs: along with second edition BB, Championship Manager was the other major influence on this design. |
_________________
Join us in building Blood Bowl Sixth Edition.
In other news, the Hittites are back. Join us in #fumbbl.hi |
|
Curro
Joined: Jun 07, 2005
|
| Posted:
Dec 02, 2005 - 14:34 |
|
| Quote: |
Championship Manager was the other major influence on this design
|
Then the ruleset is good!! |
|
|
qk
Joined: Oct 21, 2005
|
| Posted:
Dec 02, 2005 - 14:58 |
|
I like the general idea, and I love this part:
| Quote: |
Stars who are unhappy and/or mismanaged, or who a coach wants to retire, may leave a team, becoming Free Agents or Freebooters, available for permanent or temporary hire by other teams in the league
• players and staff may be traded between teams in a league (though the League Commissioner must monitor all transfers). Special rules apply when a Star changes teams: Fan Factor and other Stars' attitude can be affected
|
Details need to be worked out, but it would bring much fun to tabletop leagues, where coaches actually know each other.
Good work!
qk, unjaded coach |
|
|
pac
Joined: Oct 03, 2005
|
| Posted:
Dec 02, 2005 - 15:07 |
|
| qk wrote: | I like the general idea, and I love this part:
| Quote: |
Stars who are unhappy and/or mismanaged, or who a coach wants to retire, may leave a team, becoming Free Agents or Freebooters, available for permanent or temporary hire by other teams in the league
• players and staff may be traded between teams in a league (though the League Commissioner must monitor all transfers). Special rules apply when a Star changes teams: Fan Factor and other Stars' attitude can be affected
|
Details need to be worked out, but it would bring much fun to tabletop leagues, where coaches actually know each other. |
Yep, there's much more detail on this in the full rules: however, this system does still make quite a bit more work for the League Commissioner. |
_________________
Join us in building Blood Bowl Sixth Edition.
In other news, the Hittites are back. Join us in #fumbbl.hi |
|
PeteW
Joined: Aug 05, 2005
|
| Posted:
Dec 02, 2005 - 17:24 |
|
As one of the experianced coaches in pac's jaded league rules I can speak from experience.
My finest moment was making a star roll for a wood elf lineman who'd just made it to 6 spps.
He became a star - in fact a star wardancer! And then rolled two agility up's and got strip ball. Ohhhh he was a beauty. Won lots of games for me until he was killed in a cup semi-final. Still won the final though!
Ah... those were the days.
Try the rules - they are fun!
PeteW |
|
|
pac
Joined: Oct 03, 2005
|
| Posted:
Dec 02, 2005 - 19:29 |
|
Btw, my next task with these rules is to slim them down as much as possible, moving all highly situational text (ie: 'It is highly unlikely, but if x and y, then z (unless a, b or c) …') to a separate FAQ section in an Appendix. Anything that emerges from feedback here could then be added to that FAQ. |
_________________
Join us in building Blood Bowl Sixth Edition.
In other news, the Hittites are back. Join us in #fumbbl.hi |
|
pac
Joined: Oct 03, 2005
|
| Posted:
Dec 05, 2005 - 15:13 |
|
| PeteW wrote: | My finest moment was making a star roll for a wood elf lineman who'd just made it to 6 spps.
He became a star - in fact a star wardancer! And then rolled two agility up's and got strip ball. Ohhhh he was a beauty. Won lots of games for me until he was killed in a cup semi-final. Still won the final though! |
I'm surprised that Pete doesn't mention that it was me who fouled his AG 6 super Wardancer to death (the sight of a 1 on an apoth roll has never been so sweet). Yes, Stars are definitely marked men in this system.
He also doesn't mention this Star's Quirk: he was Superstitious. In the case of this player, Pete decided that this meant that he had to wear leaves in his hair during the game: otherwise his superstitious star elf would refuse to set up at the start. This rules set is responsible for stripping any number of trees bare! |
_________________
Join us in building Blood Bowl Sixth Edition.
In other news, the Hittites are back. Join us in #fumbbl.hi |
|
pac
Joined: Oct 03, 2005
|
| Posted:
Dec 06, 2005 - 15:42 |
|
<b>Cool things that can happen under this system:</b>
- Big Guys (Stars only) can lose their negative Racial Characteristics!
- a Star can get his own personal Player re-roll (he can even get more than one!)
- a Star can acquire his own Personal Apothecary!
- players can change position (gaining skills and stat ups in the process!)
- except for unique Secret Weapon Stars, it would be entirely possible (much better odds than the standard rules) to develop a normal player (Star) to the level of a published Star Player's stat line and skills. Yes, it is well within the bounds of possibility to get your very own Griff Oberwald or Varag, or even (since negative traits can be lost, see above) Morg or Ripper!
For those concerned about balance, I should also note that for each of these exciting possibilities, it is <i>more</i> likely to suffer their reverse:
- any Star can <i>gain</i> the equivalent of negative Racial Characteristics - your Ogre can become as dumb as a Troll
- a Star might refuse to be treated by any kind of apothecary
- players can demand to change to a worse position: 'Boss,' begins the Star Blitzer. 'I've been thinking about the next step forward in my game, and I really think that Lineman is my natural position ...'
- while you might develop a Star with the stats of Griff Oberwald, he is also likely to be an overpaid primadonna, who: hates playing in the rain; doesn't play at his best if the crowd's too small; is destroying his talent with his weirdroot habit; is hated by opposing fans who always aim their rocks at him; and is constantly being tapped up by rival clubs.
PS - Be warned: pac will continue to perform CPR on his thread until he gets some more responses. Where's macavity when you need him!? |
_________________
Join us in building Blood Bowl Sixth Edition.
In other news, the Hittites are back. Join us in #fumbbl.hi |
|
tneva82
Joined: Jul 17, 2004
|
| Posted:
Dec 06, 2005 - 16:14 |
|
Well. Certainly sounds like fun set of rules. If I was able to play tabletop version I would probably lobby for use of these rules in it. |
|
|
JanMattys
Joined: Feb 29, 2004
|
| Posted:
Dec 06, 2005 - 16:40 |
|
Seems nice but also requires a high number of games to become funny... Local leagues often have a limited amount of games going on in a year I think. |
_________________
 |
|
pac
Joined: Oct 03, 2005
|
| Posted:
Dec 06, 2005 - 16:48 |
|
| JanMattys wrote: | | Seems nice but also requires a high number of games to become funny... Local leagues often have a limited amount of games going on in a year I think. |
Yeah, as it currently stands it does take a few matches to start getting the first Stars. I keep meaning to work on a new team creation system for it, so that you can start with one or two Stars (like you did in the 2nd edition Blood Bowl Compendium league team creation system).
That system couldn't be too random though: otherwise some coaches would keep making new teams till they got a brilliant Star from the get-go.
Hmmm: pac begins to have ideas ... Thanks Jan, you may have prompted me to actually take some action on this! |
_________________
Join us in building Blood Bowl Sixth Edition.
In other news, the Hittites are back. Join us in #fumbbl.hi |
|
|
|
| |
Gnomes are trash
Search
