Stunty (Extraordinary)
The player is so small that they are very difficult to tackle because they can duck underneath opposing players’ outstretched arms and run between their legs. On the other hand, Stunty players are just a bit too small to throw the ball very well, and are easily injured. To represent these things a player with the Stunty skill may ignore any enemy tackle zones on the square he is moving to when he makes a Dodge roll (i.e. they always end up with a +1 Dodge roll modifier), but must subtract 1 from the roll when he passes. In addition, this player treats a roll of 7 and 9 on the Injury table after any modifiers have been applied as a KO’d and Badly Hurt result respectively, rather than the normal results. Stunties that are armed with a Secret Weapon are not allowed to ignore enemy tackle zones, but still suffer the other penalties.
Stunty Overview:
Stunty has a very useful benefit of allowing players who possess it of dodging around a crowded area of the pitch with no extra hassle compared to dodging out into the open. This allows them to run through a defensive screen easier than all but the extremely high agility players. A Stunty player with an agility increase pretty much has the freedom to run where they please and will paint a large target on their head.
This ability to dodge far more freely around players should be utilised to your advantage, for example dodging into a cage is tricky even for elves with Dodge, though for a Stunty player it is no harder than a normal dodge for them. Of course the flip side to this is that players who have Stunty as a Skill are all weak players so hitting the ball carrier after the dodge isn’t going to be easy. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t perhaps do it and with a combination of skills like Side Step and Diving Tackle, even just getting next to the ball carrier can end up troublesome for the opposing side.
One thing to note that wasn’t mentioned in the skill description though is that Prehensile Tail and Diving Tackle do effect the dodges of Stunty players, it is just the tackle zone modifiers that you can ignore.
Unfortunately there are some downsides to go with the good and that is that passing plays are going to be much harder to do. The -1 that Stunty gives to passing can cause far more fumbles if throwing a Short Pass, Long Pass or Long Bomb. It also wipes out the +1 bonus of doing a Quick Pass as well. Unless you are somewhat of a gambler, this will generally force you to just run with the player who picks the ball up, or look to use hand offs to move the ball.
The other downside to Stunty is the fact that it makes the player easier to hurt, they end up in the KO box on an injury roll of 7 or 8 instead of 8 or 9 and they also end up in the Injured box on the roll of a 9 as well as the usual 10, 11 & 12. The rules have changed slightly for the better now though as a roll of a 9 is always going to just be a Badly Hurt, whereas before you would have to roll for the type of injury and they may have ended up dead!
Despite those downsides, Stunty can be a very effective skill if the advantage is put to good use. It is easier for you to get to the opposing ball carrier, or to a loose ball. You can run through defences, though doing this with a lot of players through a lot of tackle zones can spell trouble, so be careful not to overdo it. It can also force the defence to spread out to create a larger blanket of total tackle zones, rather than fewer overlapping tackle zones. With overlapping tackle zones you have less squares to dodge through. With a more spread out coverage, you can gang up on their players easier as there is more space and as there is more space, it may make advancing or forming a cage/screen around your ball carrier easier.
Experiment and see what works, good use of movement and positioning can be key to winning or losing games. Stunty offers you different options than what are available to the majority of teams in the game. Learn to use it well and your squishy players can play above their weight!
What happens if a player has Stunty and also gets Thick Skull?
Would that mean a 7 is KO but a 8 is Stunned?
should be 7 Stunned and 8 KO and I would talk with my opponent in front of the game but still following the rules…. or am I wrong?
7 is a KO and 8 is a stun
It was deemed as an acceptable anomaly. Being that Thick Skull is a strength skill and anyone with Stunty would need a double to take it. I can’t really see anyone ever selecting Thick Skull unless perhaps they are assigning skills randomly.
Does tackle skill have any effect on stunty players? I imagine it negates any dodge skill? But, maybe not as it states that stunty players ignore tackle zones so maybe tackle skills may not work?
Tackle doesn’t have any adverse affect just because a player has Stunty. Though as you mentioned those players will pretty much always have Dodge which it negates. This makes them easier to knock over and then also injure as they have Stunty. Also means you can’t use the Dodge skill to reroll any dodge rolls away from the Tackle player either.
The fact they have Stunty though doesn’t make any extra difference compared to a non Stunty player that also has Dodge.
The Stunty skill states:
“The player is so small that they are very difficult to tackle because they
can duck underneath opposing players’ outstretched arms and run
between their legs… To represent these things a player with the Stunty skill may ignore any enemy tackle zones on the square he is moving to when he makes a Dodge roll (i.e.,they always end up with a +1 Dodge roll modifier)…”
The tackle skill states:
“Opposing players who are standing in any of this player’s tackle zones
are not allowed to use their Dodge skill if they attempt to dodge out of
any of the player’s tackle zones”
So a tackle player negates their ability to use Dodge skill but, do they keep their innate +1 dodge roll modifier for being stunty? If this is not the case they are basically just using their unmodified agility roll to pass through these players tackle zones which for an AG3 player is 4+; with the modifier it would be 3+. Basically, I’m trying to understand if the +1 modifier for Stunty is affected by tackles removal of Dodge skill. I’m guessing it’s not as Dodge is a different skill which they also possess (most stunty players)
Dodge and Stunty are separate skills, so Tackle doesn’t negate the +1 dodge roll modifier that Stunty provides. It just prevents the reroll and use of Dodge when defending against being blocked.
A small note, for anybody reading these comments: Stunty does not ‘provide’ a +1 modifier to dodging. You always get a +1 modifier when dodging – Stunty simply prevents the negative modifiers from enemy tackles zones, which would mitigate this bonus for a non-stunty player.