Hello, we've sorted out a new set of house rules. Putting them here in case some would like to test try them out. We played a few games so far and like how it turns out to be.
Some may have read my house rules to re-balance the teams down in the forums, and they do work well enough, but i always like to have the least amount of house rules for the most balanced games possible. With the Foul Play expansion, things started to get ugly and the game was getting less fun for us. The Foul skill easily illustrated the problem: players cards toying with coaches strategy (and potentially critically so) was not fun. The issue with Foul is the same as with Sprint: they sort of unbalance the game by messing up with card cycling. Sprinting teams were always favored, while fouling teams are despised due to the "unfun" mechanic. Fouling out your newly recruited Star Player meant a really bad turn of event...out of complete randomness and without risk. Sprinting your linemen out of your hand created super-teams randomly and there was nothing a coach could do about it (or else Sprint as well).
1. I believe that players should have an impact on the match up (or tournament) where they are played, not on the coach's hand, and even less so on an opposing coach's hand.
2. In the tabletop game, sprinting is not too risky, but gives a slight edge to move about (tactical, and can give you a shot at scoring). Fouling is quite risky, but can get rid of a downed player.
3. I found that teams that relied on tackles or cheats were far more prone to bad luck streaks than teams who relied on sprint. (The Ball skill is ok, imho, with its own little game going on).
---House Rules---
1. Sprint : Optional skill. The sprinting player rolls 2 block dice.
1. Success: If any of the dice result in a (POW), the player adds 1 to his star power at the beginning of the scoreboard phase (2 POWs don't add 2, just 1). Place a team counter (or any marker) on the sprinting player to remember that bonus.
2. Trip over: If the dice result in 2 (X)s, then this player is downed or injured (representing him tripping over during his effort). (Note: the most common reason for injury would be a player using sprint as a Downed Skill)
3. Failure: Any other results (Blank+X, Double Blanks) does nothing.
So this means that some players will be worth more if left around, even if downed. It represents their ability to be threatening due to their speed. The added risk to sprint is relatively minimal (1/36), and has 3/4 of adding a +1 star power to win the match up. (and 1/4 to have nothing happening).
Example: A Wardancer successfully tackles a player, then uses the Sprint skill, rolling two dice. A double POW comes in, so she will now be worth 4 at the start of the scoreboard phase.
I evaluated that the former sprint skill was worth much more than 1 Star power point per Sprint skill used, so while at first you may be surprised to see the value of some players at the end of a round, imagine back what it was when that Lineman (1) turned into a Treeman (4) every turn. So this gives a new tactical incentive to injure sprinting players or protect downed sprinters with the Guard skill.
2. Foul : This optional skill can only be used on a downed player. Roll 1 block dice.
1. Success : On a (POW), the targetted player is injured.
2. Spotted!: On a (X), draw one penalty card. (note: if you're not playing with penalties, eject the fouling player). Remember, penalty cards drawn this way are kept face down until later in the scoreboard phase as normal.
3. Failure: Any other result does nothing.
The result is highly cinematic, you can imagine the gang trample action that goblins like to do. Basically the big thing going for it is that it affects the match up and not the opposing coach's ability to play the game. The risk vs reward factor is interesting here, penalties are nasty, but getting rid of some downed players is quite useful. Of course...fouling a treeman is nice, but you do have to get him down first!
3. Recycling the teams!
Coaches of Dwarf, Vampires and some non-sprinting teams know what it is to get 6 players then the 6 others in turn, for the whole match unless they spice it up with star players. With this variant of sprinting rules, all teams are now equal in this affair, so it's worth looking into. In order to keep things interesting and players on their toes:
Roster shuffle: After every 2 complete turns (so typically, at the end of turn 2 and 4), the whole team roster is reshuffled (discard and deck).
What this means is that, unless you have more than 12 players in your roster, all players will get to play before you recycle again, and then it's new lines. This will ensure that if you're fielding a crap hand while your opponent has his top notch group, it doesn't bog down into a I-win-you-win affair for the five turns (like it can currently happen when vamps and dwarves play vs each other). It also means that no one knows what's going to happen for the Blood Bowl itself (5th turn).
Star players and some other team upgrades mess things up slightly, and some odd things can happen (like having a player not participate in the 2 round bouts, due to more than 12 players being on the roster). So this means that star players are not just a bonus now, they can sometimes "overshadow" your normal stars, but there's more chance of it taking the place of a weaker player.
--------------
So there you have it, a variant to try out if you want the sprint and foul skills to impact match ups where the players are played, rather than the team rosters.
Edited by Oakwolf