[Chaos] The Blackguard Bruisers Team Blog

[FlabberMcFizzleJerky]

Hi there everyone, FlabberMcFizzleJerky here with my first team for the CTA league, and hopefully eventually in the CC as well. This will be more of a newbie learning mistakes blog, and because of that feel free to give tips and tactics if you'd like. I would certainly appreciate it.

So, to start off I went with a very standard approach to a chaos team:

4 warrior
7 beastmen

3 RR

This works out perfectly to 1mil, and gives me what I feel is the minimum RR needed for a starting chaos team (I tried 2 RR in singleplayer before... Not a good idea at all.)

My first game was against my RL friend that I got to join the league with me, wgb49 and his Dark Elves team. My confidence was about middle of the road, as I knew Chaos have a real hard time at the beginning of their team career. However, I've played with a Chaos team before, and was already used to their weaknesses, and tried to remember them throughout the match. Also, wgb49 is about as new as I am to the game, so I knew we would be tactically about on par with each other.

I get the toss, and choose to kick, as per 'bashy' strategy for kicking as outlined by the Coach. I figured with their agility (and better starting skills) the Dark Elves would be able to quickly score, giving me time to tie the game, and then head into halftime receiving.

Everything is set up, the ball kicked (I got an extra reroll - awesome), and wgb49 began his turn. The next four or five turns results in multiple easy dodges failed. Both of the elve's RRs were gone by turn four. On my end, I was also having problems with 2db's going against me. I really felt the sting of lacking a block skill on my players. Somehow, between the bad dice on both sides, I am able to get a hand on the ball, cage up, and score at the end of turn five. I realized only after I scored that I should have burned turns instead of scoring immediately. A mistake that could have cost me the game.

Turn six, I kick again, and get a blitz. Only get a push on the assassin, while meanwhile being too overzealous to get future blocks in. I push all my players to the LOS, hoping my heavier players would break the LOS in my favor. A turn later, and the runner is halfway in my backfield. Next time I'll make sure not to go overboard on a blitz.

However, luckily for me the goal was just outside the runner's reach, and we hit halftime 1 - 0 my favor.

I'm recieving, and push the opposing line back a row on my turn. The dark elves then proceed to dodge two of their players (a blitz and a lineman I believe) through my line (both of them dodging through two tackle zones threatened by two players each) and then blitz my ball carrier down. thankfully, he was somewhat close to the LOS, because I was able to blitz them back and recover the ball.

The rest of the match consisted of fighting over the ball, constantly changing possession. wgb49 would have scored at turn 14, but he decided to dodge his assassin out of a tackle zone, and rolled a one. By this point we were both out of RRs, and thankfully for me I was able to capitalize on the turnover and stop the touchdown.

Finally, on the last round, I got greedy and attempted a quick pass to squeeze out one more SPP in an otherwise SPP dry game (only points that game came from the single TD). The pass failed, and a blitzer knocked the reciever out of the way. A lineman scooped up the ball, and attempted a long pass to a man standing in the end zone. Pass was accurate, my interception failed... and the catch failed. Game Over. Score still 1- 0 my way, I breathed a sigh of relief at a game that very well should not have been mine to win.


Pulled 80k on the win, and bought a doctor with 50 of it. The 30 remaining will go toward a minotaur, when I get the money.


(small note: not sure how to do replays, so some of this may be inaccurate. How does one do replays?)

[John McGuirk]

Nice report! You seem a lot more canny with the game than I was when I started playing online (I still have nightmares about that 0 RR team). Coach's articles will do that for you though - I know I could stand to refresh my own memory on one or two of them.

Looking forward to seeing both you and wgb49 in a future Crunch Cup

[Gallows Bait]

Originally Posted by FlabberMcFizzleJerky

(small note: not sure how to do replays, so some of this may be inaccurate. How does one do replays?)

You can watch the replay of any match you've played by going into the Single Player menu and selecting to Load, then looking to the replays section.

It also works when it comes to downloading other people's replay files, if you save them into the correct folder on your PC they are loaded in the same way.

[Lebe666]

Your doing well for a newcomer ! Glad that last pass failed for your oppo...

[FlabberMcFizzleJerky]

Originally Posted by Gallows Bait

You can watch the replay of any match you've played by going into the Single Player menu and selecting to Load, then looking to the replays section.

It also works when it comes to downloading other people's replay files, if you save them into the correct folder on your PC they are loaded in the same way.

Awesome thanks man.

Originally Posted by John McGuirk

Nice report! You seem a lot more canny with the game than I was when I started playing online (I still have nightmares about that 0 RR team). Coach's articles will do that for you though - I know I could stand to refresh my own memory on one or two of them.

Looking forward to seeing both you and wgb49 in a future Crunch Cup

Thank you, I'm trying to be at least decently detailed with these reports as I can, so that I can read back over my own mistakes. I'm glad you like them though! Yeah, seriously Coach's articles have been the greatest source for my game tactics. His articles are probably the main reason why I chose chaos as well. Normally, I would have gone with a more diverse-looking team, with many different positions and whatnot. I didn't know till I read about them how incredibly versatile they can be with mutations. That and I wanted a team that would continue to be great, and they seem to grow into a monster of a team after awhile.

I can't wait to join the Crunch Cup. Just need to get four more games in... Chaos needs all the matches it can get. lol.

Originally Posted by Lebe666

Your doing well for a newcomer ! Glad that last pass failed for your oppo...

Yeah, thankfully it was +5 with no RRs remaining. Thanks for your support!

[Orient]

Aaaah, a fellow chaos coach. Glad to see it. I'll keep an eye on your blog, as ive just restarted my own chaos team (the smalltown screamers) so look forward to seeing you continue your road to unholy glory

appologies if any of this is old hat, but here are some bits of advice which i've found incredibly useful, and keeping all these in mind i dramatically upped my game.
1) as per the 'new player' guides floating about, never expect your block dice to come up with . Too many of my early games were squandered by building strategies around the idea that because i was playing a bash team i would be knocking people down. This is not always the truth, especially so against teams with block and/or dodge.
2) As a chaos team you CAN pass. Yep. Agi 3 aint great, but its still respectable. Dont rely on this as your main turn plan, but if a neccessary block does fall through, then i can form a back up plan, or even just a quick way to move the ball an extra few squares (3 squares on a 3+ pass, 7 squares on a 4+)
3) Your beastmen really are the stars of the show - the warriors stand in the way and soak damage and road block while they do the running around. Saying that however, if you can get a CW into possition that they can score a TD, go for it. 3SPP is half the way to that all important first skill
4) You get to make one ST4 blitz per turn. Use it well.
5) Never underestimate the power of a beastman with block/frenzy teamed with a player with guard. You'll soon be shovelling players off the pitch. It may mean taking instead of on some occasions to ensure that 2nd block being thrown, but its better to face one less opponent than to try and roll to break armour. Chaos is a numbers game about out numbering the opponent and imposing your own gameplan through strength.
6) when you do have that minotaur, never make a game critical blitz with him. If you need to make a blitz and need to take someone down, do it with someone else.


as a slight, which god will you theme your team around... if any?

[FlabberMcFizzleJerky]

I've actually been reading through your team blog as well for pointers and inspirations. I'm glad you've enjoyed the blog so far.

Thanks for the tips, I'll make sure to add those tactics in my next game. Hopefully my throws will go better next time as well. heh.

As far as which god to base off of, I originally was going to name the team "Children of the Khorne" but I figured that everyone had already seen at least one chaos team named that before. Past that, I actually don't know a whole lot about the chaos gods... sad, I know, playing chaos without knowing their fluff. There anywhere I could read up on them?

Oh, I wanted to talk a bit about team progression and where I want to head with it, and see if it is a decent enough idea. Obviously this is all subject to change depending on skill rolls and player death/injury, but here it is regardless:

1 mino - Killer build - claw, block/juggernaut, MB, piling on

2 warriors - blockers - block, guard, MB, tentacles

2 warriors - killers - block, guard, MB, claw, frenzy

2 beasts - killers - block, MB, frenzy, piling on, claw

2 beasts - ball blitzers - wrestle, tackle, dodge/two heads, strip ball

2 beasts - handler - sure hands, extra arms, block, big hand

any extra sideline beasts will be general blockers - block, guard.. MB if they somehow get enough points.

My main concern is that there isn't enough guard. I only have it planned for the four warriors and any extra sideliners, and even then two of them I eventually have frenzy on, meaning they may be too often out of place to give a guard benefit.

I'm also somewhat worried about the minotaur. In my singleplayer campaign my mino got doubles right off the bat, so taking a killer route with him seemed like a decent idea. However, if I don't pull a double, I'd either have take the lesser juggernaut skill, or something more generic like MB and hope for doubles later.

This is the plan for the team so far, barring any random skill rolls. Any advice? Is there too many killers? Should I switch the mino build to the tentacle snare? Anything else off that I'm not catching?

[Nikolai II]

Smurf would say that as long as you have a ballhandler the rest can be killers (or so I assume)

Piling On is often not recommended for Wild Animals, since suddenly they have no tacklezone if they fail their next wild animal test (as opposed to getting to keep it as is the usual case)

Tentacles and Claws in some order (with block on a doubles) is probably better, yea. (Luckily they start with MB, so you don't have to pick that )

[Netsmurf]

You do not need any killer warriors, your warriors should all start out with block, guard. Then you need to design two special killer goats, do not worry about block before skill 4 or 5, they should be like this:

Mighty blow, piling on or claw pending the league you are in, then frenzy or block. I would go with frenzy and take block as fifth skill. Why you say, block does not kill anybody and all you want with those two guys are to try and take out all the skillless players, like zombies and other fodder, to gain a numerical advantage.

Getting two ball handlers is ok, but I would settle for one. Then you need one or two sackers, with wrestle/tackle and strip ball.

The rest are going to be utility goats with block and guard.

If you ever roll a double then take diving tackle unless its on a handler or a killer. Then consider if you want pass and for the killer its Jump up if you have Piling on, else ignore it and take piling.

The Mino should start out with claws, then stand firm or jugger, and tentackles and prehensile tail are great. I would not take piling on unless my hole gameplan is to blitz mino all the time. This is how I would do it

[FlabberMcFizzleJerky]

Very good points, especially the mino starting with MB... I'm derpy sometimes. Let's rework it a bit:


1 mino - Roadblock/killer mix - claw, tentacles, stand firm, guard, block on double

4 warriors - blockers - block, guard, tentacles, MB, tackle

2 beasts - killers - MB, piling on, claw, frenzy, block

2 beasts - ball blitzers - wrestle, tackle, strip ball, dodge if doubles

1 beast - handler - sure hands, extra arms, block, big hand

1 beast on field and all other extra - block, guard

That does feel a bit better. I'm a bit hesitant on the killers w/o block, but I see the logic behind it so I'll give it a go. Hopefully I'll be able to get in a few more matches some time soon... I'm having a bit of trouble finding players. What time is everyone on?