I would take tackle. There are millions of dodgy elves in the Open, and you can't really get enough of it. In other leagues you might want extra arms, but a block tackle beast who can do a bit of ball handling as well is a useful player in this league.
EDIT - And great result Screwie. Taking anything off Janek is always like a victory, particularly with an early-stage chaos team like yours. Congrats.
Mighty Blow works against everyone though. Tackle just works against elfs, amazons, halfings, goblins, human catchers, ghouls, lots of other players with agility access or who have taken dodge on a double... you know what, tackle is pretty good! I'd still get mighty blow first though.
Tackle gets you more chances to roll against armour, mighty blow makes your armour rolls more likely to succeed. If only there were a maths teacher lying around to run some stats for us...
Another option, I guess, is frenzy. It has about the same chance to knock over a dodger as tackle, and gives you a crowd surfing threat.
I'd still take tackle though.
I do like Big Hand and on consideration, I would take that over Extra Arm. Also the beastman's name is Crazy Paw, it's too perfect to ignore.
But Tackle is a good choice too. It's more generally applicable and, as a ball-picker-upper, he'll probably spend a lot of time near the ball and near Dodge-tastic enemies.
I'm persuaded, it's a choice between those two.
I'd probably go the big hand / extra arms route with that guy. Mighty blow / tackle / claw are all generally more useful on a chaos side, but on the sure hands guy I'd specialise a different way.
Of course, I don't have enough bash skills on my chaos, and my last opponent said "it's like playing against elves" because of all the dodging I was doing, but still. ;-)
Basically the rest of the team should be bashing, but it's still good to have one guy who can actually get the ball afterwards.
And as always bbtactics is worth consulting.
I actually think (sorry Screwie!) that sure hands is a poor pick for a beastman skill. It's ok early on, when your 3 rerolls are needed for blocking. When everyone has block, however, rerolls are for special plays such as ball handling and I would rather pick up on a 2+ and use a team reroll 17% of the time than have a 11% failure rate without the possibility of using a team reroll to help. Sure hands on its own is just not good enough, but sure hands and extra arms together seems like overkill to me.
I also personally don't like to overspecialise beastmen for ball handling. A blodger with foul appearance, sure hands and extra arms sounds great, but then they get splattered and you have no one useful left. They also take up a huge chunk of TV in an already inefficient team. I prefer to give a couple of block guys extra arms so that they can handle the ball reliably, and just build everyone else for hitting.
That's just me though - everyone has their own approach!
Sure Hands is a decent first skill for a beastman, but then you end up with a beastman with a lot of points (as he's your ball handler) and Sure Hands as one of his skills. It's not completely wasted though, unless, like me, you end up with two ag4 beastmen plus your original Sure Hander who now never touches the ball.
If that doesn't happen though, it's great to have a Block/Sure Hands beastman, and even better if you have dodge. In a developed league like this, there's a good chance you'll run into Strip Ball, and Sure Hands means a push is suddenly just a push again.
I think you're missing the second and to me more important role of sure hands - negating strip ball. As my favourite teams are of the dodgy, speedy, variety strip ball is fairly high on my wishlist. Suddenly that 2d against wrackle gutter runner blitz goes from 11.1% (21% with reroll) to 44.4% (69.1% with reroll). That is a massive difference and is often the only way you can pop the ball loose against bashy sides.Originally Posted by Everblue
In wasn't forgetting it - I have never been in a situation where strip ball has been used against my ball carrier in multiplayer BB.
Last edited by Everblue; 18-12-2012 at 07:08 PM.
Tackle is a good choice, as you can leave him deepish to splat any pesky catchers breaking through, and still have a good chance of scooping the ball up afterwards - I often build Skaven/Human/etc throwers like that. It also gives you some extra tackle while your main killers are still developing.
Big Hand and Extra Arms are both valid choices too, as it's very nice to be able to have the option of a super-reliable pickup.
Wardancers!?
Thanks for the tips all.
I took Tackle in the end. It's more generally applicable and although it wont help in my next match (Dwarfs, eek) it'll help the team against those that come after, in more ways than Big Hand will. Crazy Paw will have to wait a little longer to get his crazy paw.
I have never had a Wardancer with strip ball roll a push against my ball carrier - a situation where sure hands would be useful if I took it (which I rarely do).
It is a single matchup, and it's something that rarely happens in that matchup *in my experience*, and so to my doesn't seem worth a skill to me. Perhaps I've been fortunate, but it seems to me that strip ball protection is a use for sure hands that will come into play say once every 10 games at best, whereas if you give him tackle it will be useful every game.
Sure hands, for me at least, is nice for AG2 and AG3 players without mutation access. Otherwise 2+ with a team reroll I personally find to be ok and prefer to get other skills like block, dodge and tackle.
Flings are a special case since I will not act with a treeman if a reroll has been used already that turn (taking root usually means my drive fails, as does double skulls on a block), so sure hands allows me to be more cavalier with the trees.
S'just how I see it though. I've only been playing 6 months...
EDIT - I do sometimes come across as a pompous git in these posts, don't I? Not intentional! I'm actually thinking about this stuff quite a lot at the moment and it's just nice to be able to vent it somewhere...
Last edited by Everblue; 18-12-2012 at 10:28 PM.
Sure hands is a brilliant skill and every team needs at least one. Not because it negates strip ball, but because it preserves rerolls. You're going to have to pick the ball up loads o' times in a game and if you can factor in a free reroll to all of those then goddamn it's just great. Also LISTEN TO JIM it means those magic moments where you waltz into six tackle zones, waltz out and throw a long bomb, they happen at least twice as often. Pythagoras on team maths was my MVP for that reason. My dark elf team on fumbbl only came into its own when I never had to waste rerolls on picking things up, and I had a reasonable chance of getting it in one or two tackle zones.
BIG HAND IS ALSO GOOD, PLUS PEOPLE DON'T EXPECT IT. (Also extra arms).
Every team except Dark Elves... Dump-Off is the awesomer version of Sure Hands!
Surprise is a rather undervalued commodity, but I love using it.
You will find at least one strip baller on the majority of developed agility sides not just wardancers. Its a common skill pick for gutter runners, elf catchers, frenziers of various descriptions. Lowkey was probably highlighting wardancers as for a lot of wood elf coaches strip ball is the first skill choice on one of the wardancers. Combined with +AG and/or leap it can make a mockery of a cage
strip ball leapy ag5 bastards are heartbreakers
Guess I must have been lucky not to have it used against me then, but I do watch a lot of high level games and don't see it there either. But in the occ none of the three tier 1 elf sides have a strip baller, there's no strip baller in the two top tier skaven sides in the ukbbl either.
I just don't see it.
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