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JanMattys



Joined: Feb 29, 2004

Post   Posted: Oct 21, 2021 - 18:37 Reply with quote Back to top

MattDakka wrote:
Success changes if you can pick your opponents or not.


It also changes if you only pick competitive races. I already told you, just because the matchmaking is automated it doesnt mean that coaches can't minmax their chances and pick. Pickers will be pickers, no matter the system used to give them games. And if the system will be automated, there will be a much narrower variety of races and skill picks because people won't be as ready to play weird teams. The whole division will be worse because of it.

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JackassRampant



Joined: Feb 26, 2011

Post   Posted: Oct 21, 2021 - 18:43 Reply with quote Back to top

I dunno, Matt. I don't think there's a way to quantify who's good at Blood Bowl, because there isn't a Platonic form of Blood Bowl out there to compare any given BB environment to, and because the ins and outs of matchmaking defy any kind of simple analysis. Ranked and Box both are what you make them, and both can be gamed in ways that wouldn't be applicable in any other format. This is true of every single league and tournament. That you don't see this is hilarious, because you play very hard to the meta of your chosen environment.

Different formats encourage growth. I found the Ranked Amateurs when I couldn't play Box because of low traffic in the European wee hours, when I could play. Ranked only requires two coaches to be online ... if they'll play each other. I had a hard time getting games with my straight teams, so I decided to pick a gimmick, and boy was it a great ride. That team is more fun than a barrel of monkeys, and they aged like a fine wine, so that now they're almost like mobile Dwarfs. And they STILL get game offers just because everybody wants to have played them (I've been playing C mostly, though). But it wouldn't have happened in Box, because the demands of the format are different. Ditto in any given league.

I'm really looking forward to the new scheduler/gamefinder merger. I can hop in the scheduler and if I don't get matched, hop on Gamefinder with the exact same team. How will this affect my CR? Heh, I don't really care. Not that I don't care about my CR, just that I'm willing to trade some CR for a better chance to get a good match (in my case this is a good thing: I feel like i did a thing whenever I pop my head into the Legend bracket playing 11 linos at 2M). If I did care enough to try to max my CR out, though, I'd build teams that could both compete in Box and get games in Ranked. Elves? Necro maybe?

If you can't be with the format you love, honey, love the one you're with.

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MattDakka



Joined: Oct 09, 2007

Post   Posted: Oct 21, 2021 - 18:55 Reply with quote Back to top

If you can pick with automatic scheduler as well, play 100 games with Amazons with automatic scheduler and see if you never face Dwarfs/Chorfs.
If you never face Dwarfs/Chorfs then picking is possible, if you sometimes face Dwarfs/Chorfs then picking is not possible.
What we already know for sure is that an Amazon team never faces Dwarfs/Chorfs by using the GF if the coach really wants to avoid them.
JackassRampant



Joined: Feb 26, 2011

Post   Posted: Oct 21, 2021 - 18:59 Reply with quote Back to top

What? Are you telling me the universe of picking is limited to avoiding dwarfs with amazons? That's goofy. Sorry, not going to engage this one any farther.

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MattDakka



Joined: Oct 09, 2007

Post   Posted: Oct 21, 2021 - 19:01 Reply with quote Back to top

No, but just one example is enough to prove that picking in the Box is not possible.
You can't avoid a specific race in the Box.
You could avoid certain TVs, though, by cycling teams, that's true, and some races are more common/less common in certain TV-brackets.
That's not exactly picking, though, it's more sweet spotting.
For picking I mean: "carefully choosing/refusing the opponent coach and race with pinpoint accuracy".


Last edited by MattDakka on Oct 21, 2021 - 19:12; edited 1 time in total
Nelphine



Joined: Apr 01, 2011

Post   Posted: Oct 21, 2021 - 19:11 Reply with quote Back to top

You can absolutely pick in the box. You have to do it by coach instead of by race, but it certainly happens.
MattDakka



Joined: Oct 09, 2007

Post   Posted: Oct 21, 2021 - 19:13 Reply with quote Back to top

So, in a Box draw you can choose to play vs a coach you want every time you activate?
Really?
Nelphine



Joined: Apr 01, 2011

Post   Posted: Oct 21, 2021 - 19:16 Reply with quote Back to top

Yes. And just like GF all it takes is lots of patience to get the right matchup.
DonnyRainboe



Joined: Sep 13, 2011

Post   Posted: Oct 21, 2021 - 19:20 Reply with quote Back to top

I doubt it. But I'm only only person with one point of reference. A Human one at that. I like the way the box ended.


I've found I can not play humans the same now. Not sure why. Long live the King.

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MattDakka



Joined: Oct 09, 2007

Post   Posted: Oct 21, 2021 - 19:22 Reply with quote Back to top

On the GF you can see the coaches and the races.
The Box scheduler hides the coaches and the teams they are activating, so I'm skeptical about the possibility of picking coach and race with an automatic scheduler.
Maybe you can check if a coach is online, but that's not really picking him, it's avoiding him.


@DonnyRainboe:

maybe you find harder to play the Humans because without MVP nomination you need more games to get the core Guard skills on the Blitzers. Moreover, you can't get anymore a stat with a lucky first level up roll at just 6 SPPs. Yes, you can take a stat but you need 18 SPPS, it's quite a long road without MVP nomination and you lack other skills while you bank the SPPs.
In the process, since the injures now lean towards MNG, you struggle to play properly/build the team.
The Humans have a better Thrower and Break Tackle helps them too, but the random MVP and the more severe injuries don't help them (the random MVP could end on a crippled/dead player). They are an AV 9+ team so they tend to get injured.
To be clear: I'm not implying you are a bad Human coach, I mean, the new rules don't help them, if not for the Thrower and Break Tackle improvements. I forgot there is the Halfling, but TTM is not super reliable even with multiple rrs.
JackassRampant



Joined: Feb 26, 2011

Post   Posted: Oct 21, 2021 - 19:33 Reply with quote Back to top

Okay, fine, one more response.

MattDakka wrote:
No, but just one example is enough to prove that picking in the Box is not possible.
No, that's not the case. Just because one kind of picking is not possible doesn't mean another kind isn't. But I think the answer lies in your overly specific definition of "picking" when in reality there are more ways to pick than one can count.

Quote:
For picking I mean: "carefully choosing/refusing the opponent coach and race with pinpoint accuracy".
Nice way to show off your blinders. That's one kind of picking, but there are others.

In the NBFL, which is very high TV, I joined with Amazons as a way of sounding off on how hardcore I was (Amazons suck in NBFL). I did pretty well, but after five seasons I crashed and decided to rebuild with a new race. I found myself in a division with three rivals: Simyin, Dark Elves, Humans. So what did I play? Orcs, of course! That's picking.

In my NCBB try-hard days, I always had a weak rival and a good rival. The weak one was a free victory point, and the good one was so I'd also be sure to have a good game to hype and do fluff for, because fluff was 10% of the standings. That's picking.

In Blackbox, you can pick your opposing coach if you know when he's activating and with what. You can also add your bugaboo as a friend and not activate if he's online and not in game, so you can dodge him fairly reliably. That's picking.

There's more to it than picking too. Different formats encourage different kinds of minmaxing, maxmaxing, sweetspotting, and other kinds of metagaming. There's no pure form, and no form is un-cheesable, but they all cheese in different ways. So yeah, just limiting your definition to one kind of picking is dishonest.

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Last edited by JackassRampant on Oct 21, 2021 - 19:48; edited 2 times in total
JanMattys



Joined: Feb 29, 2004

Post   Posted: Oct 21, 2021 - 19:38 Reply with quote Back to top

MattDakka wrote:
That's not exactly picking, though, it's more sweet spotting.


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Last edited by JanMattys on Oct 21, 2021 - 19:40; edited 1 time in total
Strider84



Joined: Jun 03, 2009

Post   Posted: Oct 21, 2021 - 19:40 Reply with quote Back to top

your problem is all you measure your fun of is Coach rating / win ratio. If you have a problem if other people don't face dwarves with zones but you do that is really your problem because you just overstate the importance of other people's coach rating.

if you offer fair games and are nice to people they will offer you games again even if you are a very good player. that might help with you sitting around gamefinder and everyone thinking "I don't want to play that try hard MattDakka", I don't even need to look at the matchups he will accept because it will be mostly 49% ish or less for me...

I also like CR, and I also try to win, but I don't seem to have much trouble finding games with my Pro elves, Vamps, Ogres or even Underworld.

I would also prefer an scheduler option to more or less get a guaranteed game if I can't find one, but I don't see why teams with access to (non scheduled) games should have a huge advantage. it's not like with seasons you can farm up your team of stat freaks. you can still profit from team building, but it's more of an advantage if you have a lot of games played, because eventually you can end up with a team more or less customized to whatever you want it to be. You already have that advantage and at the same time already whine about possible teams getting a maybe similar advantage of being able to build a team similar to your 5 season team in 1 season...

MAaybe play some fun races and actually try to have fun with your opponent instead of trying to optimize only your fun?
MattDakka



Joined: Oct 09, 2007

Post   Posted: Oct 21, 2021 - 20:18 Reply with quote Back to top

Strider84 wrote:

MAaybe play some fun races and actually try to have fun with your opponent instead of trying to optimize only your fun?

No because:

1) tier 3 teams don't have a right risk/reward CR ratio;
2) they don't represent properly the fluff, so they are not even fun for me, I know the fluff and they don't match it; this is how an Ogre team should look:
https://fumbbl.com/help:OgrekT2020
Gnoblars have ST 2 and the roster portrays better the Ogre race.
3) with Season Redraft is even more pointless playing Vampires. If they started with Pro, at least...


Last edited by MattDakka on Oct 21, 2021 - 20:20; edited 1 time in total
JackassRampant



Joined: Feb 26, 2011

Post   Posted: Oct 21, 2021 - 20:18 Reply with quote Back to top

On another topic,

MattDakka wrote:
@DonnyRainboe:

maybe you find harder to play the Humans because without MVP nomination you need more games to get the core Guard skills on the Blitzers. Moreover, you can't get anymore a stat with a lucky first level up roll at just 6 SPPs. Yes, you can take a stat but you need 18 SPPS, it's quite a long road without MVP nomination and you lack other skills while you bank the SPPs.
In the process, since the injures now lean towards MNG, you struggle to play properly/build the team.
The Humans have a better Thrower and Break Tackle helps them too, but the random MVP and the more severe injuries don't help them (the random MVP could end on a crippled/dead player). They are an AV 9+ team so they tend to get injured.
To be clear: I'm not implying you are a bad Human coach, I mean, the new rules don't help them, if not for the Thrower and Break Tackle improvements. I forgot there is the Halfling, but TTM is not super reliable even with multiple rrs.


I'm 13-7-3 with serious Humans in [C] division (2-0-3 with all linos who take only random general skills), and I'm actually finding that they're about as good now as they were before. Cheap rerolls means you can sock up 4-5 of them so you can have a crazy turn once per half or play a bit more aggressively because you can sometimes make up for bad dice with an extra reroll.

The new rules actually allow for fewer permanent/deadly injuries, 1/4 of all injuries instead of 1/3. But there are as many MNG/NI results (new NI is ignorable, just a MNG) as there are Badly Hurts. End result: team development is not impacted but play is, as more players miss games but fewer have to be retired.

Leveling up is ... a wash. I don't want special rolls on my Blitzers, and now they develop up the GS-access skill curve much faster because Cas and TDs are worth the same but fewer SPP are needed for 2nd and later improvements. Linos can be given random G first skills, so they level faster and become better bargains if they get good skills or become fodder/get cut if they get weak ones. But it sucks trying to get Guard Linos, which means you need to be able to function well on 2-3 Guard at a time, unless you luck into a Block lino on randoms and then save up for a secondary skill. I suppose that's an argument for taking an Ogre, but I've yet to do that, so can't report. Throwers QP'ing on a 2+ means you can farm SPP on them. Oh, and Blitzers are 85k now, woo-hoo!

The new rules aren't any harder on Humans, they're just different.

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