Cyanide BBTactics in the OCC Season 22

Yes, with 620k inducements I'm looking at...

merc troll w/guard 190k, useful for assists, can go on the LoS if I like, should in general help protect the rest of the team
wizard 150k
apoth 100k (cause I don't have one)
and for the final 180k I'm thinking babe + merc lino w/DP or block, or 2 babes and merc lino, or babe and a bribe, or babe and a 4th re-roll, or for max team building safety a babe and a 2nd Apoth

 

Well I've decided to test the waters at the OCC and Kjel needed a replacement in Tier 7 so:

my Chorfs are up for the challenge:

Chris & the Slaves in 7c

 

that could be a very painful first match!

 

Nurvana kick off T1 with a 0-1 loss to Blackmist's Scourge of Boruke. Deaths from previous season took their toll as feared when a 2nd half position that still looked fine for a draw, even after getting virtually depitched in the first half, melted down with a 1.2% Turnover from the unskilled warrior. Things spiralled out of control after that, as they are wont to do in bb, and a 6 int ate my wizard, followed swiftly by Brienne, the heart and soul of the team, dying.

No claw, no PO, no AG4, (almost) no tackle, no time for skill recovery, no plan, no hope. Just me. At my most dangerous. Be afraid. Nurvana are still gunning for the title. RAWR.

 

I would have rather had Talisa go down but that did look painful. at least you have an easy one next week to recover.

 

Sorry J... I was supposed to play him with my Woodies SSC game 5 but his comp crashed and I ended up with the admin. good news is that he could be worse after bashing me to h*ll!

I thought he had only 10 players when I last looked at his roster, he must have bought a few. expect some rookies. (Things on my Table right?)

meanwhile I'm giving up 300k inducements for the first two games against undead... reroll from div2 BallztotheWalla, and then 1100ish Undead with a block mummy and only 10k from buying the second. I need some dodge, in hurry!

 

So it seems I still can't beat Kaz even with Orcs vs High Elves. During the first half I MNGed two of his players (one on a foul) and we tied 1-1. My block dice was woeful but he started a turn with a snake eyed dodge allowing me a relatively easy equalizer.

2nd half at 11 vs 11 he swiftly KOed 2 of my Blorcs, then BH my killer. Outnumbered, I had to play risky to score as I could not protect the ball. This involved a 2+ dodge and 2 GFI in the blizzard. First off I had to clear a path and rolled where a would have been enough. So the RR was burnt and obv the second GFI failed (on a 1, so bliz did not matter). There was no way I would see the ball again after that, and he cas'ed another Blitzer before scoring the winner T16, while I failed to inflict any further damage.

I wouldn't call it a nuffling but the dice were not kind and against such a coach and such a team (5 Guard and 3 AG5!) this proved fatal. 2nd OCC loss for the team and a poor start to the season, but plenty of time to bounce back. Luckily my last lvl3 Blorc got the MVP and levelled-up, another MB will be welcome against the bashy side of the division.

Thanks for the game Kaz, great play as usual. One day...

 

I just picked up a 2-0 win over Stahlburgs Nurgle, thanks in large part to Nuffle.

I got a blitz event on his drive allowing me to catch the kick and disrupt his positioning eventually scoring on turn 7.

On my drive he twice at least he blitzed my ball carrier only to fail a GFI, which allowed me to run in the second.

The one downside is my Multiblock/Jump Up Assasin got killed early on. I decided to save the apo for someone more important, only for no other permanent injuries to occur.

Oh yeah, I ventually used my wizard at the end of turn 18 to save a Blitzer from being surfed instead of anything related to the ball.

 

S22 MD1 vs The Royal Avengers/Kurigan
*
Well sock me silly, what a match. An Ogre that stood around thinking about food and double skulls that wouldn't leave me the fuck alone. A really up and down game, first turn, 347 takes an armor bust Apo'd back to BH, the very next block, dead guard blocker and the first death in Tier two. The trend of my chocolate armored blockers continues. Some greed blocks result in no score for the first half after I re-roll double block to double skulls on turn eight......really should know better by now. Second half, I start getting some KO/BH and bottle it up. Kurigan makes a ballsy play that nearly pays off but 2 GFI later and a 2plus dodge from 666 gets the two dice sack on a block lino. I pick up scoot in behind some cover when more greed blocking* leaves me out of position and 666 in blitz play range of Griff, who push/skulls much to my delight. 666 turns on the after burners and flicks granite up making for the end zone. Suffice to say I don't lay a single block on turn 16 and run it in for the winner. Some higher than normal 2D armor rolls from Kurigan and double skulls from me made this tight to the end. Although one could argue the Ogre evened that out with his bone headedness. Probably wont be greed blocking anymore unless its 3D. At the end of the day I got the win and that is a great start to the season. A blocker hit lv2 so gets guard, to replace the dead one and I will hire a rookie. Leaving us at 2020 for MD2 vs Tlaxnpec's (no disrespect meant I couldn't remember the name) dark elves 'The Nocturnals'. Should be another good game. Foolishly hoping to be 2-0 before I tread the undead path ahead, IIRC playing all the dead guys consecutively. Kurigan played well and came up with some crafty moves to keep in the game, I think he'll cause some guys trouble for sure which will be great for taking points off of important opponents. MD2 here we come..........

 

I fought like hell the first half trying to get the ball. It was one of thos back and fourth battles with thralls and vamps leaving the pitch and a BH Wight named Son of Son of Ulric. I guess I killed his grandpaw and 20Phoenix killed his pappy so that bloodline obviously does not like Vampires.

I did finally manage to get my hands on the ball and thought it would be a good idea to throw a 3+ pass over a mummy into a tackle zone. It failed. and then...

Spoiler

...well the reroll worked and as slow as vampires are there are no zombies fast enough to catch them. I think that demoralized him and the rest of the game just worked. I really wish I had not stolen the ball on T16 to throw a needless pass, his ghouls need to level more than I needed a 175spp vamp.

Oh, a spoiler was stupid when I already changed my sig. and no one watches games until the end of the season anyhow I guess.

 

Dark Flings start off with a 2-1 win against Khemri

 

Took a 1-0 win over some flings. Was a tough match with no claw, Zara and two str 7 block trees about. A rotter died (meh haha) and the dp rotter is -mv but that is ok I guess.

The Kraken (BoN) is now lvl 4 and has Grab while Captain Jack Sparrow has leveled with a doubles and took DT (block DT now, plan is now SF, PT, tackle/guard, doubles = dodge)

 

MD1 saw my dwarves draw 1-1 with Saintpaul's amazons, in what should have been a favourable match up for myself. Still, didn't lose, so I consider that a good start.

 

In 7c Chris & the Slaves started of with a rather bloody 2-0 against Captain Thorreks Norse.

 

My newbie Vamps started off by facing Raikaria's +600k Norse, losing 2-0, failing 3 out of 3 regens, Vampire killed, dead vamp grabbing the MVP. So I bitched at him, because that was all I had left to do, from turn 0's pitch invasion omwards.

 

Match Day one was against Naecken's chaos dwarves. He had an awful start, quad skulking on an opening block, before paying any attention to the ball. My only player who was in range of the ball was my normal agility wolf. I sent him forward to knock a dwarf out of the way, but failed the pickup and reroll. Probably could have done things better, and tried to get tackle zones on the ball, but never mind. A bull centaur failed to knock down the wolf who had a tackle zone on the ball, but his agile hobgoblin took the ball and dodged away ok.

There was a bit of a melee on the halfway line. I was closing in on the ball carrier on turn 6 but a round of two double skulls of my own put pay to that. His Minotaur got a further double skulls followed by loner on turn 7, which meant that play stayed around the half way line, we both retreated our best players, whole trying to damage out opponents on the way.

Half 2 - I picked the ball up with the agile wolf, whilst screening my half if the pitch. Naecken punched his way through and got a bull centaur into base contact. I broke away to the left, killing a dwarf with the other wolf, and tying up a lot of his other players on the right. I had the numbers by this point, so my zombie cage advanced to the end zone in a couple of turns, and I stalled there til the end.

Naecken almost pulled off a one turner to my horror, but was one square short. Must learn how to do them myself, and prepare for others doing do better.

But very pleased to get a winning start in tier 2, where dreams come to die, and enjoyed validating the match immediately, the joys of admin hood.

My guard, block ghoul - Rolpart the Decrepid levelled up and rolled double 6! So will enjoy him before he dies from the inevitable thrown rock, or failed go for it.

 

Boys in Spandex over in 3D bagged a 3-2 win over Staffan's Chaos boys of skull Carriers.

The price was horrible tho. 2 MA busts, 1 on my leaping AG5 catcher and superstar catcher got killed

 

1-1 over my chaos opponent with my ogres

 

In 3A, Romances With Wolves played against Nota's Disciples of Innoruuk. I was going into the game a big underdog on skills, but with enough inducements to take a wizard (160K), which is exactly what I did. Nota won the toss, chose to kick, and proceeded to do what his team does best, which is hug the offense and force you to make blocks against all the blodgers, 4 of whom have SS (two blitzers and both witches). I did what I could, but the end result was that a strength 4 blodge/SS/Leap/Tackle witch elf ended up prone but not stunned next to my rookie ghoul with the ball, and because she is Str 4, got a 2d jump up block on him the following turn. To exacerbate matters, she KILLED him, so the ghoul lasted for exactly one block, having been just hired on. I then used my wizard to get 1/4 KD, which was useless, and the dark elves scored on turn 6/6. In return, I did KO 4 players, one of them by a DP gang foul (the DP did not get ejected on his first foul, for a change).

Being down 0-1, I received again, with 2/4 elves waking up, and a Riot giving me 3 turns to run offense instead of two. That had consequences for the rest of the game, as the extra turn allowed me to take all my blocks on the LoS instead of trying to rush in the equalizer in hopes of salvaging the game. The elf armor finally started breaking for real, and in the span of the next 3 turns, a blodge/guard lino got BHed, another lino (with Kick) got MNG, and a blitzer was killed, but the apothecary fixed him into a BH (meaning he was back immediately). I also got a free shot at the STR 4 witch, when she ran into my half of the field to create pressure, albeit completely on her own. While that cost me position, I simply could not pass up the opportunity to hit her, so she got sandwiched and blitzed by a WW, who tackled her down for a KO. I also came within a 3+ roll of equalizing, but the wight failed the catch, and that was that.

To open the second half, 1/4 elves woke up from KO, the monster witch elf not amongst them, so I kicked off with an 11 on 7 player advantage, and both wolves active (my wolf woke up from KO at halftime). What followed was a half of excruciating chase after elves, who made everything they asked of their d6. I believe one end of turn dodge was failed, but beyond that, EVERYTHING worked, including things like dodges into 2 TZs, dump-offs out of 2 TZs to a marked receiver through an interceptor, and multiple pickups and GFI. Eventually Nota fell victim to his own success, when on turn 15/14 his witch elf threw a double-gfi 3+ pass to his side-stepping blitzer, but my wolf was in the way, and finally rolled a 6. Interception. It's especially funny because for two turns in a row I could have picked up the ball on a 2-3 GFI-pickup, but both times failed the GFI, scattering the ball in a way that was very favorable to the elves (in the second case it was 1/8 chance the ball ends up unmarked, and that's exactly what happened). In the meanwhile, my DP zombie gang fouled the assassin twice, stunning him the first time and killing him outright the second time. The kill also earned him an ejection, so that was the end of fouling (I was too busy chasing after the elves thereafter). Anyway, the interception got returned for a touchdown, while I was rewarded for not skull-hunting a witch elf (I didn't pile on to the KO turn 15/15) by having the same wolf KILLED by a "why not" turn 16/15 blitz. Had he POed, he would have been prone, and most likely not gotten touched (there were much easier blitz targets in range for simple SPP hunting...). Obviously regen failed. 1-1 final socre.

GG - was a great game, except for the fact that my already slim hopes of doing well this season now became virtually non-existent.

The armor breaks were a very special story this game. I had a chance to throw a LOT of blocks, ending up with 32/52 KD, 21/43 armor breaks, and 25 total injury rolls (a crowd surf and a dose of piling on RRs happened). On those 25 injury rolls I got 4 CAS (BH, MNG, DEAD -> BH, DEAD), 7 KOs and 14 stuns. Basically, exactly what one might expect from 25 injury rolls, DP and MB notwithstanding. In return, the elves broke my armor 6/18 times, which is also about average. On those 6 injury rolls, they got DEAD, DEAD, BH, KO, KO, Stun. I mean, SERIOUSLY? They did almost as much damage on 6 injury rolls, without MB, as I did on 25 injury rolls WITH MB?

As has been typical for the last 3 games, the opposing team did not fail d6, it simply DOES NOT HAPPEN. 1 fall on 50+ dodges, several of which were into one or more TZs, no failed pickups, no failed passes, no failed catches, no failed gfi. In fact, the break I got wasn't because Nota failed a throw, it was because I finally rolled a 6 myself to intercept the pass. The only thing that didn't work spectacularly was 3/8 KO wakeups, which without babes is actually only 1 below "expected". Still, that was a sub-par result and had a large impact on the flow of the game.

I know I should maintain more composure and worry less about things out of my control, like players dying. Please allow me to put this in perspective, and then I will shut up. Over the last 6 games, I've lost (to death, and in two cases, smashed collar bones):

2 Flesh Golems
3 Ghouls
1 Wight
1 Werewolf
2 Zombies

Two of the ghouls were valuable, the wight and werewolf were irreplaceable (Str 4/ Blodge wight; MB/PO werewolf). That's an ENTIRE TEAM WORTH OF PLAYERS, in 6 games. It would not be debilitating if I had agi 4 and had a shot at leveling up replacements. But I am not, and I now have 6 rookie positionals in a division full of 2000+ teams. In other words, my team has just been retired, even though it has at least 8 more games to play in S22. I know you can recover from some attrition. I don't see how I can recover from fielding 6 rookies backed up by one decent golem and one star wolf.