Non-League Sparring Games

[lamaros]

Here is a thread for those people who like having a game or two outside the league to list themselves, and have a bit of banter/advice if a fun game is had.

I'll be first.

I'm Lamaros on steam and Lamaros is my coach name. If you see me online and you feel like having a game let me know. I have a couple of different teams and I'm up for making a new one if people feel like trying out a particular matchup too. If anyone else feels like a game write here and I'll try edit everything fancy like in this original post.

[Strazos]

Same.

[Ice Cream Emperor]

For sure. All my names are the same as well.

[Ruvaldt]

I will play a sparring game at nearly any time that I am online, even if I am already in a different game.

Steam Name: Ruvaldt
BB Coach Name: JRuvaldt

[Llyse]

Coach name: Catfud
steam - f13: Llyse

Up for a game right now :)

[Sky]

Shteam [f13]Sky
BB Mister Sky

Right now I'm back to beating on the AI trying to wrap my head around any sort of control on the field rather than just a game of reacting to the other player. Was always my weakness in chess, maybe I'm not cut out for these kind of strategy games 

[Ice Cream Emperor]

The AI (especially on 'Hard') will definitely show you the advantage of conservative defensive positioning -- standing off the cage with the majority of your players and forcing the offense to do something. Mostly because the AI simply will not do anything; it is so risk-averse that it will frequently move the ball backwards or not at all if you confront it with a decent defensive formation. (On Medium it will take more risks and therefore be more likely to score, and also way more likely to turn over.)

[HaemishM]

Steam and BB name: HaemishM

I'm not on a lot, but I probably should be doing some practice runs against non-retards.

[Hoax]

I've harassed almost all of you for a game but in case you didn't get it I'm down whenever I'm on steam for people to hit me up. Try to message me though instead of inviting me to chat. No idea why people always use invite to chat.

[Falconeer]

Anyone up for a game right now? I am on Steam, shoot me a "Ho!" if you feel like smashing faces.

[Ingmar]

I could also play some but don't expect any banter as I only have one working arm at the moment. Probably a lot of interface fail as I try to use the mouse left handed too.

[Falconeer]

In our sparring match, lamaros' team of mean goblins has given my silly bunch of queer undead the first victory. A strange match, where he had 390k TV more than me which I aptly spent in the awesome Mummy Star Player. Believe it or not, he killed the dude in the first turn. And that was just a couple of turns before he sent out for the game BOTH my werewolves. I would have been owned, if it wasn't for a crazy series of double 1 (3 in a row) that he collected in the final turns. And all hail the ghouls. That said, I had lots of fun. Goblins really are a fun team, even though you don't want to use your dearest team against them, as some of your guys are not gonna make it out alive.

[lamaros]

Yeah a fun and funny little game against Falc. I started well with my Bombardier throwing accurately in the first two turns, injuring his Ramtut in turn two with no regen roll, then proceeding to take out the two wolves with Looney as the half went on. I passed up the chance to score in hopes of taking out a few more players but my Trolls and Fanatic were off form and Looney had spent himself early. Lots of concussed but no more injuries. Meanwhile Falc had taken out the productive bomber in his second go.

Going in to the second half I thought it was touch and go, with the most likely chance a draw, but I failed to hold even that. In the second I finally managed an injury with my Troll and Falc finally made a regen roll. Apart from the bomber I don't think Flac took out one of my players, but I failed dodge rolls left and right KOing and injuring my players, opening up the chance for him to run down the side and score, which he did in the end.

I had two turns to score and thought I was good. But a rolled double 1s to pick up the ball and Falc came in and locked it up, before picking it up in the pouring rain with his Wight.

Good fun game all in all though. Especially fun when you call out "I'm going to kill Ramtut" and then he's off injured and follow it up with a "Now I'm going to kill the Werewolf you failed to blitz with" and get similar success. :)

For curiosity I uploaded it to BBManager. We only injured one player each on blocks. Falc with my Bombadier and me with my Troll. Looney got another 3 for me and all the ones I lost I lost on failed dodge rolls (10/20) and GFIs. Including the death of my Dirty Player :(

[Ice Cream Emperor]

Well evidently there is some crucial trick to sending messages on Steam that I do not understand -- apparently, going to someone's profile and clicking on 'Send a Message' is inadequate  -- so I will remain merely-passively-interested in games until I figure this out.

[IainC]

Well evidently there is some crucial trick to sending messages on Steam that I do not understand -- apparently, going to someone's profile and clicking on 'Send a Message' is inadequate  -- so I will remain merely-passively-interested in games until I figure this out.

They have to either be in your friends list or in a shared group. All I ever do is right click on the name in my friends list and choose the 'send message' option from there.

[Hoax]

You've never used an IM client like AIM or ICQ? The Steam friendslist works like that. You access your friends list (I right click the tray icon and tell it to give me friends) and then you go to the f13 BB'ers group and you can see who is online/offline/gaming etc. Then just click their name and type a msg.

[Ice Cream Emperor]

Like I said, I was going through the Community->Profile route. Hopefully the friends list will treat me better.

[Teleku]

Yeah, that confused the fuck out of me at first as well.  I saw people through the steam browser, and there was an actual option to send them a message, but it didn't do anything.  Eventually I figured out you actually have to do it from the friends list, but it was frustrating.  So, keep that in mind anybody else who is following along.

[Comstar]

Patch tomorrow means we can create a F13 league that allows match making, just like the public leagues do.

[Falconeer]

That's very cool. We can call it f13 Spar League, what do you think?

Still not so useful considering you can only sign up a single team, so less flexibility than Auld matches. But hey, sweet.

[Ice Cream Emperor]

That sounds great.

I would like to float the possibility of using such a league as a development league for future seasons, to avoid some of the noob-vs-vets TV shock we've seen so far during this one. The details would obviously need to be worked out -- it could be based on total games (limiting play in the development league to some degree, but maintaining the highest level of season-equivalent-verisimilitude) or simply setting a TV ceiling for new teams (theoretically allowing very well-groomed teams, TV-wise, into future seasons, though honestly I doubt anyone would bother.)

Obviously the final analysis on the whole 'keep veteran teams in the same league as new teams' decision isn't in yet, but I think if we are going to continue playing into future seasons (yay!) we need to consider what to do about the possibility of new coaches joining only to face 1000 vs. 1700+ TV matchups. I do think inducements work decently, but they work a lot better if the lower TV team still has at least some development. Also I think that less experienced players tend to get less value from inducements, which can snowball fairly quickly.

[Kalle]

My local gaming club runs a closed Blood Bowl league and an open feeder league below it where the top teams from the feeder league qualify for a spot on the closed league. Teams in the feeder league can challenge anyone in the league whenever they like, but they are not allowed to play more matches in a season than those scheduled for the pro league to keep people from farming teams there. This works both to let experienced coaches play and level alternate teams to a decent TV and to act as a buffer to protect the newbies from the shark tank of experienced coaches and TV1800+ teams in the closed league.

[Modern Angel]

Oh man, really? That sounds pretty cool

[Strazos]

What's to guard against folks conspiring to nurturing awesome teams to bring in?

[Der Helm]

Kill their well-groomed players ? 

[Ruvaldt]

I'd play in any f13 league, no matter the rules.  Just tell me who to bludgeon.

[Comstar]

Make the feeder league having a lower value teams - say 1500 or 1600.

[Ice Cream Emperor]

What's to guard against folks conspiring to nurturing awesome teams to bring in?

As I see it there's two basic mechanisms you could use to govern the transition from development/skirmish league to actual seasons -- they could be used individually or combined.

The first is a TV limit. This would be based on the teams already confirmed for the next season, or the values of the teams at the end of the previous season. It could be generous -- set to the average of the teams, for example -- or it could be stricter -- based on the lowest value, or the average value minus 200, or something similar. Teams from the development league that want to participate in the next season would have to come in under this TV cap -- overdevelopped teams could sell off players, etc. if necessary.

Pros: allows unlimited play in the skirmish league without too much concern about future qualifying.
Cons: being able to develop a team to a high TV and then sell down to a lower one will tend to result in a better-constructed team; coaches willing to meta-game could exaggerate this effect.

The second option is a limit on games played. This would presumably be equal to the number of games that have so-far been played in all carry-over seasons (so #2 and #3 so far), or it could be capped at the total games in the previous season. Some wiggle room could be allowed, but basically coaches who are seriously considering using a team from the development league in the next season would have to track their games played and be sure not to exceed the already-agreed-upon limit.

Pros: highest level of verisimilitude in terms of random development, etc. Maintains an advantage for teams that tend to level/gain SPP faster, who could theoretically come into a season well above the TV average. The rules are designed to balance teams by game played, not by TV.
Cons: limits play in the development/skirmish league, making it more about the former than the latter. Coaches who want to play a lot of skirmish games could get around this by constantly rerolling teams, but it's a hassle.

Obviously you could combine the games played limit with the TV limit in all sorts of ways. The most obvious is to have a generous TV limit combined with a stricter games played cap.

/dissertation

[Strazos]

What I was referring to was more the situation where guys get together to maximize the SPP from games by conspiring to allow max SPP gain; ie - let in touchdowns, let particular players hit all they want and not get hit back, etc.

[Ruvaldt]

Considering you can only have one team, I'd wager that sort of thing would be noticeable.  Not that it isn't a valid concern; it just seems like one would probably figure it out if someone kept creating new teams just to have them wasted by another opponent who raked in massive SPPs every time.

[Cadaverine]

Not only would it probably be pretty noticeable, but I think most of us are pretty stand up folk, so it wouldn't be an issue.  But, people are people, and winning in a video game is tre important, so who knows.

[Kalle]

TV limits are problematic because just like the public TV matchmaking they disrupt the balance of the game. Agile teams, elves in particular, are balanced around being able to earn more SPP's per match through passing and scoring than the slower and bashier teams. They will reach higher TV's (barring player death and injury) faster. They are more likely to hit the TV limit first but then they'll be forced to wait there for the bashier teams to catch up as they play more games to compensate and negate one of the advantages of playing elves. I like elves but I rarely see them played due to their fragility and a TV cap would just be one more disincentive to play elven teams.

[lamaros]

What's to guard against folks conspiring to nurturing awesome teams to bring in?

As I see it there's two basic mechanisms you could use to govern the transition from development/skirmish league to actual seasons -- they could be used individually or combined.

The first is a TV limit. This would be based on the teams already confirmed for the next season, or the values of the teams at the end of the previous season. It could be generous -- set to the average of the teams, for example -- or it could be stricter -- based on the lowest value, or the average value minus 200, or something similar. Teams from the development league that want to participate in the next season would have to come in under this TV cap -- overdevelopped teams could sell off players, etc. if necessary.

Pros: allows unlimited play in the skirmish league without too much concern about future qualifying.
Cons: being able to develop a team to a high TV and then sell down to a lower one will tend to result in a better-constructed team; coaches willing to meta-game could exaggerate this effect.

The second option is a limit on games played. This would presumably be equal to the number of games that have so-far been played in all carry-over seasons (so #2 and #3 so far), or it could be capped at the total games in the previous season. Some wiggle room could be allowed, but basically coaches who are seriously considering using a team from the development league in the next season would have to track their games played and be sure not to exceed the already-agreed-upon limit.

Pros: highest level of verisimilitude in terms of random development, etc. Maintains an advantage for teams that tend to level/gain SPP faster, who could theoretically come into a season well above the TV average. The rules are designed to balance teams by game played, not by TV.
Cons: limits play in the development/skirmish league, making it more about the former than the latter. Coaches who want to play a lot of skirmish games could get around this by constantly rerolling teams, but it's a hassle.

Obviously you could combine the games played limit with the TV limit in all sorts of ways. The most obvious is to have a generous TV limit combined with a stricter games played cap.

/dissertation

If we did something like this we would have to do it on a games limit and not TV.

[Ruvaldt]

I would vote games limit.  It seems fairer to those who want to start a team through the skirmish league and import them because the game really is balanced more towards that end than TV being a valid measure of team strength, as Ice Cream pointed out.  Just look at Chaos teams for a good example. 

Once they move into the regular F13 league they might be subject to some kind of TV cap, of course.

[Ice Cream Emperor]

TV limits are problematic because just like the public TV matchmaking they disrupt the balance of the game. Agile teams, elves in particular, are balanced around being able to earn more SPP's per match through passing and scoring than the slower and bashier teams. They will reach higher TV's (barring player death and injury) faster. They are more likely to hit the TV limit first but then they'll be forced to wait there for the bashier teams to catch up as they play more games to compensate and negate one of the advantages of playing elves. I like elves but I rarely see them played due to their fragility and a TV cap would just be one more disincentive to play elven teams.

Absolutely, and I mentioned this in the Cons. The main contrary argument is that the TV cap addresses Strazos' concern about cheating/farming.

And, equally importantly but not related to the seasonal play -- is it a skirmish league first (for fun) and development league second, or vice versa? Because only getting to play 8 games and then sit on your butt because your team is Just Perfect is kind of a pain, if you can only enter one team in the league. If on the other hand you can remove the team from the skirmish league once they reach their GP limit, and enter another team for more fun games, that becomes less of an issue.