Rules "catching" a ball

[donkeyjon]

Ok, I think I know the answer to these questions, and ruled accordingly last league night, but I want to verify.

When a ball bounces out of a square for any reason, and lands on a player, the rules say that that player attempts to catch the ball. As such, this action is fundamentally the same as catching an inaccurate pass, so, the ball bounces onto one of my players, who is AG 3 and is in two enemy tackle zones:

1. If he has no skills, he catches the ball on a 6+.

2. If he has Nerves of Steel, he catches the ball on a 4+ (ignoring the tackle zones).

3. If he has Catch, he catches the ball on a 6+, but gets one free re-roll.

These three outcomes are consistent no matter what the source of the ball bouncing was, be it an attempt by another player to pick up the ball, a bouncing kick, a player blocked onto the ball, a bouncing throw-in from the sidelines, an inaccurate pass, etc.

Is this all correct?

 

[Netsmurf]

Yes it is and option D: Have catch and NOS, then 4+ with reroll.

note that should a big guy stand in the path of the ball, he will only attempt to catch it if he has any tackle zone!

 

[Nikolai II]

Similarly prone players, players with the no hands skill or players that have been hypno-gazed, will also simply scatter the ball on.

 

[Lebe666]

Seems right.

 

[donkeyjon]

Also, a ruling we've made in the past but I wanted to verify:

The player MUST try to catch the ball. There are several situations where the player's coach would very much like that player to not catch the ball, but he cannot choose to fail the roll on purpose. He must make the roll and try to catch the ball.

Is this correct?

 

[Coach]

Correct you must always try and catch the ball if it scatters to you (unless you have the No Hands skill, are Hypnotized, Boneheaded, prone, etc.).

It is to be consistent with always having to try and pick the ball up if you move onto it.

 

[danton]

You can choose not to use the Catch skill to automatically re-roll a failed catch though.

 

[mrpier]

So if a strip ball blitzer got a push on a ballcarrier, and the ball landed in the same square that the ballcarrier got pushed to, the ballcarrier would get a chance to pick up the ball again?

 

[Mico Selva]

If I'm not mistaken, the ball scatters from the square that ballcarrier is pushed to, so it will always scatter to a different square.

It can however return to the ballcarrier's square after another player fails to catch it and causes another scatter.

 

[Coach]

As Mico Selva said, the ball scatters from the square the ball carrier was pushed to, so they can't try to catch it straight away, unless further scatters take it back to their square.

Example:

Blitzer A blitzes Ball Carrier B and gets a
Ball scatters from B onto A, this counts as a catch roll and not a pick up roll, so A HAS to try and catch the ball even if you don't want to (like if it is the last turn and they don't have enough movement left to reach the end zone, but you have others players left to take an action who can)
If A fails to catch it, then it could scatter back to B who can try and catch it, this would be really annoying!
It could ping pong around various players until one manages to catch it or it lands in an empty square.
If it does land in an empty square A could dodge away and try to pick up the ball, if this fails it is a turnover unlike the failed catch.

 

[Darkson]

You can choose not to use the Catch skill to automatically re-roll a failed catch though.

In addition, you can use a Team Re-roll to re-roll a successful catch if you want.

I did this once with my (old) Khemri Mummy - of course, the reroll was a 6.

 

[Kolat]

In addition, you can use a Team Re-roll to re-roll a successful catch if you want.

I did this once with my (old) Khemri Mummy - of course, the reroll was a 6.

Nuffle must still be laughing at that one...