Saturday, June 16, 2018

The First Turn

Hello Guild Ball fans, today I am going to talk about the importance of the first turn. The first turn is the most practicable turn in the game, as well as the easiest turn to theory craft outside of play. A strong turn one will put us in a better position for the second turn. If we continue to have a better turn than the last, it puts us in the best position to have a successful outcome from our game. So we should have a routine first turn for our team into many match ups to start out strong. The more practiced our first turn becomes, will give you more time on our clock for later turns.

Turn one begins at the kick off.
When we are kicking we want to apply as much pressure on the opposing team with our kick off model. Ideally this should be a striker model who can threaten to take the ball away from the receiving team, or by giving a superstar play an extra jog before the game to apply their threat to a larger area of the pitch. When kicking we want to try and mess up the receiver's turn 1 plan; this could be by kicking to the model they want to score a goal with, forcing a key player to retrieve the ball leaving them in a position we can capitalize on, or kicking to a spot that the other team has no way to get the ball for there team turn one which eliminates the benefit of receiving.
When receiving, we want to have our team spread out to cover as much of the pitch as possible to prevent getting burned by a perfect kick off. This doesn't mean to be so spread out to much that our team can execute any sort of turn one plan. After getting the ball, we should pass it around our team for free momentum or movement. Then later into the turn move in for a goal or putting our set-upped value player into the opponents team.

Different guilds do turn one differently, mainly those with access to character plays. An example of this would be Smoke Alchemists where the Alches want to stay as far away as possible from the other team with character plays, then have smoke condition the entire team. Blacksmiths are a foil to this turn one by having a very aggressive turn one having two buffed apprentices having the ability to do work. Finding out the ideal turn one for your team as well as play style when kicking or receiving takes some time, but after a few games we can narrow down what actions we tend to do.

Monday, June 4, 2018

Choosing a Roster

Hello Guild Ballers, today I am going to ramble about picking a team. I've been going through Guild ADD recently and haven't settled on a single guild yet to practice. The best way to get good with a guild is by picking a six man team and playing as many games as possible. This allows us to find what players we like and don't like in that line up, and what match ups are bad for that team. I am going to go through my thought process when I am picking a guild and my six.

When I am picking a team I look for which guilds have the best ability to reward an aggressive play style, the way I prefer to play. I thought about all the guilds I have played throughout the three seasons, and arrived at union being one of my favourites because of the diversity within the guild. With a large pool of players, a Union team should be able to be made to fit my playstyle.

Starting at captain... There is three choice Blackheart, vRage, and sBrisket. All of them play aggressively which checks off my big box of approval, but only one can be picked in a six. Blackheart has a lot of flexibility and helps both a football and beat down game but is unfocused, sBrisket scores goals but lacks flexibility so she is a pass for me, and vRage has a strong focused toolkit for beatdown. So far I have narrowed my choice down to two, both of which will be in the tournament 10, but need to pick one to be the main captain. I like to have a balanced team of goal scoring and beatdown, so I am picking to have vRage as the main captain. He has a more focused role on the team and I can use Unions inherent strength as a guild to have a balanced team.

Mascot choice... This is harder for Union then any other guild because they all are really strong. I like my mascots to bring a strong trait or play that can help the team in a pinch. Pride is the new hotness in town for the Union. Having counter charge on a mascot is insane, and his survivability deters people from wasting attacks on him.

I like to have a tough to take out model to form a scrum with. Benediction fills this role perfectly, plus he extends the range vRage can use his character plays to affect the game. Benny brings two inch reach, the best rule in the game, and efficiencies built in to him through character traits. As a result he doesn't need to use any of the teams resources to do be valuable.

Next I want a payoff player, one that has synergies with vRage that I can plan my game around. This spot is for Gutter. She brings AoE damage output, chain grab, and good kick on a resilient body. Every turn I should reliably have her contribute meaningfully towards a victory.

I have 4 players in my team and I don't have a real goal threat. My options in union are Mist, snakeskin, or grace. Snakeskin is a good piece to kill the ball with but struggles to score if the opponent has possession of the ball. Grace brings utility and fuels herself. Mist brings two inch melee, has synergies with two other players on my team, and is the only true striker option out of the three so she is going to be my pick.

My last line-up spot is a hard choice here. So far every player is influence hungry except for Benediction sometimes. I could go with a battery to supply my team with influence, or a player that I don't use unless I have to. Minx is a great battery and brings snare for the team. Decimate is an average player that I know exactly what I am going to get out of her influence if I allocate to her. Ultimately I chose Decimate over Minx to play test. If my team feels too influence strapped after a few games this will be the first swap I make. After a few games played I have found second wind incredibly useful and Decimate is good at counter attacking, but am still uncertain which one is the better pick.

Playtesting the team for some games I have found that Grace is incredibly useful in the Alchemists match, and Hemlocke to be a great pick against many teams. This brings my six up to a tournament 8, which will be 9 by bringing Blackheart as a second captain. Having Blackheart forces the opponent to respect that the game could be a fast football style game at the captain choice. To bring my self up to a 10 I will throw in Minx. Minx being a battery helps Blackheart's game, but gives me the option to switch her in for Decimate in the rage team if I feel that it is stronger in the end.

I hope that some people can apply some of this when designing their rosters. The most important part is to practice a Six that you like for a lot of games before making any major changes if any to the team.


Friday, June 1, 2018

The Ball

Hello again, it has been awhile since my last blog post. I've been trying to get a battle report video series started, but I need to find a new video editing software. Reflecting on the past games and a chat after a game with a local inspired me with this topic, the value of the ball. In the game of guild ball both players have access to the same resources, momentum and influence. However there is only one ball. The ball can be used to generate momentum, add to the threat range of our players, and is 4 VPs whenever we want it. My hot take on this topic is that we should hold on to and protect the ball for as long as possible before taking the goal. This doesn't me we should never play the ball or score unless it wins us the game, if we need to score a goal to progress our plan we should try and score the goal as late as possible in the turn. Doing this limits the potential for an immediate crack-back goal, as well as allows us to deny our opponent from using the ball to there advantage. Some teams play different to this idea, teams like Shark Fish who look to score three goals as quickly as possible will want to score whenever the opportunity presents itself. However, I still believe these 3-0 teams want to play a bit more reserved when these teams have the ball, scoring later in turns will give them a better chance to score again because more of the opponents players will have activated which makes protecting the ball slightly harder. Lets dive deeper into the different cases.

The way I like to play a team is a flexible 2-2 or 4-1 path to victory, which I feel is the best fit for my playstyle. To do so I protect the ball behind the bulk of my team on a player with some sort of defensive "tech". The tech could be unpredictable movement, close control, or a solid counter attacker. Recently the guilds I have been playing around with are Brewers, Hunters, and Union. The models I use in these guilds are: Mash or Friday, Zarola, and Mist or Decimate. Throughout the course of a turn I feel safe having the ball on these players so that I don't have my resource taken from me. If I allocate influence to most of those players they can score a goal at the end of a turn, or contribute other ways in the game. Mash and Zarola have the option to kill the ball if I need to and focus on a beat down plan. Having control of the ball gives me the advantage in a stalemate. Sitting on the ball gives my team further threat ranges by being able to dodge off a pass, the ability to generate momentum without having to engage, and forces the opponent to come to my team because I have 4 VPs in my pocket. I like to score at the most opportune time, this is more of a feel that is developed by playing the game. The last game I played was an extremely close game, I was playing Union against Blaine's Hunters. I received the ball so I passed it around my team and got it to Mist and dodged her forward, in cover and behind Benediction and Pride. There was no way for Blaine to prevent my first turn goal with Theron so I got those 4 VPs for free. The game then went into a long drawn out brawl where my players got chipped away at and controlled, while Mist was on a suicide mission to secure the ball for my team. By turn 4 I had firm control of the ball, and this allowed VetRage to to meaningfully contribute to the fight by having the extra threat range that the ball provides. The following turn I closed out the game with a goal after we traded captains. There were mistakes on either side throughout the game, but talking about the game we came to the conclusion that I won the game because I played the ball more effectively, using it to project threat even with -6/-6 move or having a key player pinned, and using it for points. 

Some situations call for killing the ball. This can be done in many ways like sticking the ball on a mascot in the corner or leaving a free ball in the corner, having the ball on a Mash, Obulus, or Corsair type player which makes it extremely difficult for the opponent to take the ball away. Some people may think that it is a negative play experience, but it is a tool that helps more beat-down style teams compete against fast paced scoring teams. Breaking the ball kill or getting creative with a scoring team to score points are very useful skills to develop and practice. There isn't really much to talk about this strategy. When the opponent will struggle to score victory points without the ball, pick the best option your team has access to killing and do that. Score a goal to win the game or grind out the last takeouts. Not all teams want to do this, if you are playing a goal scoring team it will be better to play with the ball. I used this technique playing my Brewers against Jeremy's Alchemists. I kicked off with Friday to apply kickoff pressure. I got the ball back and stuck the ball on Mash and put him behind a obstruction, the rest of my team, and in a corner. With no way to get the ball, the alchemists had to try for push dodges into mash or by having oKat get take outs. The game slowed down into the Brewers favour until Mash passed the ball to Friday who drove in the winning goal.

Lastly there is fighting for the ball. The goal focused teams want the ball to work there way to winning the game. Positioning players to threaten every area of the pitch is important to getting the ball back for our team, later scoring a goal. If we have the ball at the start of the turn we want to score first or last activation. Scoring first activation allows for the rest of the team to retrieve the ball and potentially scoring twice in a turn, but this leaves the opponent with a player they can abuse. Scoring last activation denies the opponent the ball for the turn, but shifts the teams focus to protecting the ball for the entirety of the turn. When the opponent is in control of the ball it is a feel situation of when you should pull the trigger on going in for a goal run. If you go in too early it leaves an easy target for the opponent to start attacking, too late and the ball may be to well protected to get to. Getting the timing right comes down to practicing with your team. Combating a team that is trying to play football it is sometimes better to not take out a striker right away, rather setting them up for a take out at the beginning of a turn. When strikers are taken out, it allows them to reposition. The majority of the time the reposition sets them up in a better position to threaten the ball. 

Finally I am going to leave you with two of my Golden Rules of the ball. When playing a team that doesn't want to play all out football having a model that can put pressure on where the opponent keeps the ball is valuable because if you can take the ball away from them giving us the advantage in the game or having to position the ball in places on the pitch where they do not want it. When behind in the game playing the ball is the key getting back in the game.