Norse rookie norse coach needs help

pupkinus

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Hi all,

I need the help of BBT's collective wisdom :) I've been coaching mostly Dwarfs since I started BB three years ago, but I've seen the error of my ways and rerolled to Norse. I am now playing in the lowest division of funleague (NSFW!). Three (or was it two?) years ago you've helped me start a good Dwarf career. now I hope you can help me become a good norse coach :)

This is my team:
ImageRoster.aspx


This is the team of my opponent:
ImageRoster.aspx
-- I am lucky that her Strip ball blogde wolf is not playing this match

I have questions:
1. What inductments should I take? I was thinking avout 2 babes
2. What general strategy should I adopt? WWCD (What Would the Coach Do)? Try to outbash? Dodge away like an elf? Who should be the main target for my blitzers?
3. If given the choice: kick or not?

I've tried to find some good replays of norse coaches from SvS, OCC, Old World Football . I've found some and studied them attentively, but they are all about well-developed teams. Do you know where to find good replays with low-mid TV norse teams?

Thanks for help!
 
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Limdood

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in general, NEVER kick with a norse team....you rely on numbers superiority, the initial kick off is the best shot at giving your MB berserkers and linemen a shot at causing some cas

that being said, you're in trouble vs. this team. Even on numbers (even after you lucked out with the injured strp-blodging wolf missing the game) and he has regen, higher armor, the same amount of mighty blow, and a dirty player that can give your team right headaches.

The best strategy i've seen as norse vs. teams that you can't easily outcahs, is to play like elves. Make your pillars, keep them firm and instead of dodging away, hit back...have a couple players back to run up to assist for 2d blocks to knock him away from your pillars. Necro is fast and can run around your pitch-wide screens.....so don't try one. Instead, when kicking off, stack your players in the center...3 on LOS, 2 squares back put another 3, spaced out so that there are 2 empty squares between them. Immediately behind them, put your 5 most valuable players...they are essentially unblitzable that first turn (or at least risky enough that most people won't) No one in the wide zones. This will hopefully force him to commit to one side or other (sides are good for norse, but beware he has frenzy too!) OR make a risky 3AG passing play. Once he commits, set up columns in front of him AND a column to the side (2 if you have the players). You want to box him in and contain him....then its just who gets the lucky blocks or dice to get an opening...you keep bringing up and repositioning players to keep a breakout difficult, and he'll have to get lucky or have you make a mistake to get through.

On offense, try to keep a wide front, with screens and half cages to tempt him to try to run players behind you. Once he does you can try to swing wide of his depleted defenses in front and screen off your ballcarrier. Be especially aware of the wolf and ghouls speed....they can get around screens that might LOOK good enough with a couple 3+ dodges. You may need to do a handoff to get enough speed to get around the defenses....keep your players bunched in small spread out groups to keep your options open...don't have solo players running around, they don't do anything.

The ghouls are number 1 on your hit list....be wary of blitzing them as they aren't his skilled players, but take any blocks you get and foul away...no regen gives you the highest chance of depitching them. A CLOSE number 2 is that wolf....hit him with all you've got. EVERY time he leaves the wolf even SOMEWHAT vulnerable, get an assist in and 2d hit him. Then gang foul him. Without his wolf he loses half his mighty blow and his highest speed, most dangerous player (no more frenzy makes standing a square out from sidelines safe again). If the wolf leaves the pitch, you've got a good shot....if you can force him to be so careful that he won't use the wolf to its fullest, you've got a good shot. If you can't remove that wolf, either through bad blocks or armor/injury rolls or difference in play, then you're in trouble.

Necro is a tough match for norse until you get a SF player of your own and some guard and tackle (btw, 2 tacklers before you take any more fend! fend saves your players, tackle wins games), since you can't shove around those golems and the wolf runs circles around you, but you CAN beat them.

as far as levelling goes. get that runner to 2 ASAP....a blodging ballcarrier would have given you a nice edge in this game, as he has no tacklers. Get a lineman levelled with dirty player as soon as possible. Your first berserker to 3 should probably grab PO, the second should grab guard (i actually advocate guard before a second MB, but i really miss guard when i on't have it). I'm not a big fan of kick on norse, but other coaches swear by it. I find placing kicks with norse tends to not make much of an impact (you can center the kick in their half without the kick skill and only see the ball go out of play on a 6 scatter distance AND bounce in the same direction).

as far as general gameplay goes....foul. Foul a LOT. In fact, skip the babes. A dirty player merc lineman costs 130k....you have 130k in inducements. Coincidence? i think not! Norse are one of the BEST teams at fouling. Why? because the lineman already have the usual #1 skill that most people take, and don't have access to agility or strength skills, which leaves most of them taking tackle or fend.....why not dirty player? your linemen are cheap at 50k....for 20 more TV you can have Dirty players running around (after levelling) and since norse benefit from a deep bench ANYWAYS, take advantage of it.
 

pupkinus

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thanks!!

Wow! that really makes me think. Very thorough advice.
And the DP merc lino is a brilliant idea!

I still feel I am screwed though both in the game and in the season :)
The other teams in my div iclude a 1500 tv CDwarf team, a rookie Dwarf team, a rookie CDwarf team and an 1700 tv skaven team. I think I picked a bad time to start a norse team.
But I can find solace in beating the halfling team and the underworld team. I hope :)
 

Kjelstad

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Kick, fend? you are late asking for help. the only two skills a lineman ever takes are guard and dirty player. the guard player can grab fend after.

Your niggle is going to leave the game, no doubt. Let him do it on his terms and foul the shit out of those ghouls.

I have no use for throwers. A good runner is nice though. And zerkers, MB, Pile On, tackle, dauntless. take str if it comes up though. I just read limdood's post, guard on the second is OK and I agree with most of it. Zerks are your ass kickers though

I never know what to do with Ulfs. Block or MB first? slow to level. they need guard, then you always roll doubles and take dodge and it screws it all up

I always tell myself it doesn't pay to foul regenerators but that never stops me. I was playing a necro newb today and I told him not to put 5 on the line and never put his golems on the line, next drive he put 6 on the line. after I broke his newb golems str I went and had a gang bang on block/guard that also failed to regen from the dead and that was game.

You can make a team of 15 linemen and foul your way to victory with norse. try it sometime.
 

pupkinus

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Kjelstad, Thanks for advice!
That's an interesting angle on playing Norse. Could you recommend a couple of your Norse replays. I need just the name of the league and the season number. please?
 

pupkinus

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Yeah...
I also tried HiE and even won the Aces&Kings of the RMBBL Royalists once (by accident :) ). A fine race indeed but not violent enough for my taste. I find their lack of mighty blow disturbing :)
 

Limdood

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norse can do well with low skills. In an environment with low TV teams, it means your block skill keeps you ahead of the curve on dice rolling. In an environment with higher TV teams, your inducements will really start to help. Bribes and Zara can really help your gameplan. Babes and an apothecary can keep your players alive until you really get developed.

If you don't think you have a shot in this season, then just develop the team best you can. make ridiculous passes and such (both my Ulfwereners levelled to 2 within 2 or 3 games by repeatedly making naked 4+ pickup and CATCH (yes catch) rolls to run in 2 TDs a piece). Some of these were in turn 8/16. Developing a strong team when you don't have confidence of your chances right at the moment can really help in the future.

Norse are always going to rely on good injury rolls. If you get one of those games where you just can't seem to roll more than a stun, or can't even break snotling armor, you know its going to be a long, hard game. MB and DP give you the best shots at removing enemies from the pitch.

I've heard norse basically called a team that likes to stay away from opponents, and launch 16 BRUTAL blitzes through the course of the game. Kind of a "hit and run" tactic.

If you're interested, you can look at the lineup of my norse team entering the crunch cup. The team blog should be somewhere on the first 3 pages of this subforum, titled: Ready to Ragnarok-N-Roll

although ironically i'm trying to give advice after just having lost the top division spot of the exhibition season to a Necro team :p
 

pupkinus

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Thanks Limdood!
I really like the idea of "ridiculous passes" and stuff like that. My dorf team had a passing runner and a catch+diving catch blitzer. It is such a pleasure when the opponent freaks out after a dorfish pass right into the endzone. Usually, they don't believe the threat of a dorfish blitzer/catcher in their half :)))) I would find it enjoyable to develop something similar with the norse, not as a main way of scoring but as a "Hail Mary" option for desperate situations.

For this game I'm taking a DP merc and will fould and blitz his key players. besides that, will try some "ridiculous plays" :)

thanks for advice!
 

Limdood

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don't even bother skilling for those ridiculous plays. It will only encourage you to go for them more often (less and less as a last resort). For example, you might say "well, i'll give my runner catch and diving catch so he can start catching on a 2+ with reroll, and then give my thrower accurate and strong arm so he can throw short passes on a 2+ with reroll" but once you do that, #1 it isn't a surprise anymore, and #2, why not just play high elves, who can do all that without spending 2 levels on several players and have higher armor?

i WOULD suggest skilling up your thrower to be an all-around player though. Sure hands is probably first....the ball should usually go to the runner on a Touchback, but you want to have a reliable option to scoop the ball up without saving a reroll (blocks are a higher priority for norse when receiving, you have to clear that LOS and you never know when :skull::skull: will strike next!). After sure hands, you can grab leader (if you plan on keeping him on the pitch a lot), not a terrible idea as its a 20k reroll and he's still got block (plus sure hands gives you a ball scooper if you can pop it free on defense). After leader, you have things like kick off return (allows you to keep ONLY the thrower in your backfield, sometimes even against elves, but easily against the bash teams you're facing), tackle (for more anti-dodgy fun), accurate (i don't advise this, but it's almost like sure feet, allowing you a safe option to move the ball up to 3 squares (only failing a 3 square quick pass on snake eyes now), and finally....Hail Mary pass!

With hail mary pass, you have a nice defensive skill. If you managed to score a defensive TD, or you kicked first and managed to score in the first half to equalize before halftime, then HMP can be great. Remember, playing for the draw isn't a bad thing. With elves, who get all their SPP from TDs and passes, they want to win every time. With norse, a lot of SPP are coming from Cas, and since you rely so heavily on injury dice, deciding to stall in your half, then HMP the ball deep into their half when they push hard can easily eat up 4-5 turns and possibly secure a draw if the dice aren't otherwise cooperating. (particularly attractive option when ALL their KOs recover and none of yours, for example). Finally, it gives an (unlikely) scoring threat, if you push a single player deep in their half wihle retreating the rest of your entire team....if they push TOO hard, just HMP and scoop it up and score on your next turn.

you might then consider diving catch on the runner at that point, but NO further, and i'd hesitate to even take that. Once your runners hit 4, you have the INCREDIBLY annoying block/dodge/SS/Diving tackle combo, and delaying that for diving catch is hard to justify (after dodge/SS/DT, probably take tackle and fend if focusing on pure defense for runners - sure hands if you don't like using the throwers a lot)

you'll want to lean heavily on skills like tackle, dirty player, and mighty blow. Norse are an odd team....they benefit from blocking more than most teams, BUT lack the staying power to do it a lot. This just means you have to make the blocks you get as effective as you possibly can. You want to shoot for 60%+ successful blocks if you can....focus on using your tacklers to take down key players, then foul the hell out of them. Use the zerkers on non-dodge players (unless doing double 2d frenzy hits) until they get tackle. Whenever you can't hit their best players, hit their least skilled/lowest armored. A non-block, non-dodge player goes down 75% of the time to a 2d hit, thats 75% chance to get another armor roll.

You also need to be patient with norse....having block is nice for saving rerolls, but if you go after those key enemy players TOO zealously, you can find that, sure, you got him down KO'd nice and early, but you also left yourself out of position, got a few of your players KO'd, and used up all your rerolls by turn 3! Conservative defense with Vicious and brutal blitzes, and blocking any non-stand firm players away from your columns. Many bashy players will give you more blocks than they should, thinking they have the advantage vs. your lower armored players.
 

pupkinus

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Thanks Limdood!
I am now watching your replays. Very interesting!
Btw - absolutely agree on the HMP as a defensive skill. It can save your game in some cases. An utility thrower is also a nice idea.
 

Limdood

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oh no! my replays?

lets just say i've been learning norse the hard way too :p

that first CTALE game was a soul crusher....had such high hopes for tying, then receive 5 failed KOs and a snake-eyes HMP throw (without the skill, just a desperation move).

You'll be able to see how much of a role lucky injury dice played in the CTALE games vs. Tyriok and Lebe, and you'll see my GIANT mistake of not protecting my piled-on prone berserker in my game vs. Mikko
 

Kjelstad

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I played in SSC1B season 14.

ImageRoster.aspx


OK I did take some tackle linemen, but after 9 games you need a few i guess. and I only planned on one season with them so the MB runner wasn't a good long term pick but he was a good giant killer
I got bored with them but I still play Norse in MM when I want to ruin someone's day.
 

Nikolai II

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About the thrower I'll add my 2c.

My skills for him are "Sure Hands, Kick-Off Return and Accurate" but I do him offensive, and you only need 2 RR as Norse anyway, so no point in risking either of them calling in sick.

Also, HMP can be fun - but in Cyanide the option to not use HMP is bugged. You need to remember to turn off HMP before ordering the pass, else it'll HMP no matter how much you've set the skill to "ask". Easy to forget when you are in a hurry.
 

pupkinus

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Match played. Nothing positive to report :)

2-0 for the necros
Lost 3 players by T2 (1 zerker BH)
I managed to sack his balcarrier twice but could not pick up the ball
A dodging golem killed my chances to get the ball afterwards
left with 4 players still managed a 1d blitz on his blockless dodge ballcarrier and it was :pushback: rerolled :pushback:
Left with 3 or 4 players on the pitch at half time
Second half
tried to foul - no avail, also got ejected. the DP merc got KO'd on turn 2 and never came back.
Same story but with an added error of mine leads to the breakup of the cage
the necros stall, gangfoul, feel good :)
They gang-foul-kill my berzerker (apothed to -1 MV)
My cas - zero
The only highlight is that I managed a grand total of 1 crowsurf of his wolf
to top it up: my niggle lineman got the MVP

We'll see how it goes in match day 2. At least I hope I can beat halflings.

So tempted to reroll back to Dwarfs now :) damn, even HiElfs look extra-bashy compared to the norse. What's the point of MB if half of the deam is in the injury ward?
 
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Kjelstad

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Your chances are drastically reduced if you kick. The only reason they are good at fouling is that you have a deep bench of cheap linemen. You need that first.

I tried to find the league in BBM but failed
 

pupkinus

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I am travelling now, have no BBM available. I will post the replay when I come back to my big PC.

Now, 8 hours after the game it dawned on me that I have violated two basic rules and I am very ashamed. Feel sooo stupid.

1. Never play too late at night, esp if you had no sleep the previous night. Sleep deprivation = bad thinking
2. Never give the opponent free blocks.

I've lost the flip and was forced to kick. The opponent had all players except two on the central line. The kick went deep. Then, perfect defence kicked in. Somehow (idiot!idiot!idiot!) it seemed like a good idea to use all my players to mark his players on the line and hope that after being pummeled I will be able to breach the line somewhere and prevent him from forming a cage, maybe even get a hit on the ballcarrier. Somehow the risk of giving him a ton of blocks on my players seemed like a worthy sacrifice. Damn, it almost worked :) in exchange for 3 players carted off the pitch I got a couple of hits on the ballcarrier but never manager to get my hands on the ball. I guess sleep deprivation made me believe that it was a viable plan. Maybe it was, but for hielfs not norse :) And it all went downhill from there...

I'll go hang my head in shame now...
 

Limdood

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yeah, aggressive is fine with norse, but you need to choose the right time.

Norse are actually a VERY good cage breaking team, with all that frenzy. Blitz a corner from the proper position and you can push that player completely out of the cage and make room for 3 players to mark the ballcarrier even if you don't get the corner down. THATS the time to mark up the other players or screen off the cage.

also, as you might notice from my early norse games (you said you watched some replays), i had to learn the hard way, that when you play too agressive on defense, it only takes one mistake to leave a gaping hole. you have 8 turns to get the ball back. Its perfectly acceptable to move 4 players 1 square and make a single blitz as your only actions of the turn. When on defense, every turn that goes by without the opponent making any serious progress (or only setting up for crazy desperation plays) is YOU pulling ahead....1 turn at a time closer to that 1-0 shutout.
 

pupkinus

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Everyone who wants to see my disgrace and maybe try to help me with some advice can check out the following games in BBM:

League: [FL]Sh'elf S14
Matches:
Ale Munchers - Midnight Fighters -- that's the MD1 game
and
Ale Munchers - Dorfs of Doom - that's the MD3 game with a complete depitch of my team.

Criticism is welcome. Thanks everyone.


PS: guess I am going back to dorfs (darkside of AV9 is sooo seductive right now) or Hie. I am too incompetent to play Norse.
 

Kjelstad

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Well there is your first mistake in MD1. Always pick heads.
Mistake 2, there was no reason to leave 3 players in the middle for him to beat on after perfect D
also I would have set the ulf to the inside so it could surf the wight
this guy is lucky. pick up, hand off with ag3, then 1d blocks for KO. I don't think he knows that isn't supposed to work.
then 1d block with his WW is a CAS. You surfed the WW after that so you are doing fine but I have a feeling the dice hate you. I'm going to go back to the game but I am pretty sure the dice just hate you. Sacrifice a chicken when you get a chance. Only real advice I can give.

OK you need to follow the order of operations and make your 2D blocks first and use players with block. When you are on offense knock those zombies down. push them along the line until you take them out. you job was to hit, not push them away and play elf ball. so many players in the backfield too. His dice are all 10 11 12 when he breaks your armor but you have to hit him unit he breaks. Why pick up the ball right before halftime when you haven't made all of your blocks or blitzed. your odds of a turnover are much higher picking the ball up. It is halftime, screw the ball.
 
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