Winnings and Dedicated Fans in Blood Bowl 2020 - Theory Thursday (Bonehead Podcast)

It’s Theory Thursday - where we look at an aspect of Blood bowl in detail!
Whether it’s tactics, stats or hypotheses, we’re just trying to get better at Blood Bowl!
Patreon Link: / boneheadpodcast
#BloodBowl #BloodBowl2020 #GamesWorkshop
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[@Halinn]

Most important takeaway from this is that if you have extra money after teambuilding, it's better to spend it on DF than on assistant coaches or cheerleaders. It's also a worthwhile consideration to start at DF6 instead of an Apothecary if you were looking at that.

[@davidstephenson4786]

Had this sort of discussion (not quite to looking forward to 9 matches, but same thoughts in the 3 game range) and its interesting looking at the longer season total incomes. The one point that you didnt cover that made me go all in on my goblins this season with DF 6, is that it doesnt add to TV. So with 50k in there (so missing 1 goblin from the starting line up) gives me more money post game and shoots under most other teams by 50k so gets me the bribe inducement on the first game (thus keeping a player on the field vs buy that lineman). awesome talking point though Ben, keep up the good work.

[@mattellis3297]

As a Chicago Bears fan I can safely say dedicated fans have 0 effect.....andy dalton need I say more :(

[@DougDavison]

I ran an Ogre team with DF5 starting out. I did this because I knew Ogres were expensive and I wanted to get a full set of 6 as soon as possible. I got lucky throughout the season and got a handful of wins and a bunch of draws. I lucked out and leveled it up to DF 6 and then to DF 7. We use Tourplay and let it auto-roll. It paid off really well and the additional funds helped my team grow into a playoff threat in the 1st season. Since I spent less money on my team, I would start with $50K more in inducements in each match than I would have otherwise for each game. DF don't add to your TV. At worse, that's a free prayer's to Nuffle or a Bloodweiser Keg. I'm in first place now for season 2 headed into the playoffs. I routinely buy riotous rookies each game just to keep my funds below the level of losing it to expensive mistakes. If you start with 11 players and you run a lineman instead of a positional to allow you to pump more money into DF, then if one of those gets killed you can just run a journeyman until you can afford to replace them with a much more expensive positional with your additional earnings from DF. Obviously, success in your BB games tends to snowball into more success. If you think you can at least come out with Draws instead of Losses, then I think the extra money is worth the weaker starter roster.

[@mih2]

Thanks. Just what I needed. Much appreciated.

[@TheTabletopSmithy]

I feel if you have some spare when making a team its worth chucking it into fans as then you are more than likely to gain that back after a few games that you can then use towards a player. It also puts you on track to hit that df4 sweet spot before other players do

[@roguesquadrontrainee5133]

Is DF 7 achievable? The rules only mention a max of 6 dedicated fans in relation to team drafting (unless I have overlooked something). If you have a DF 6 team that wins its match and manages to roll a 6 post game, it seems like DF can increase to 7. Automatically goes down if you lose a match so you must keep winning to sustain it, but if this is the case then there would probably be some slight alterations to your maths. I will add that I assume GW's intention is to cap DF at 6, but the current rules don't seem to explicitly forbid DF 7 during a league.

[@ThanatoselNyx]

I wouldn't assume anything with GW rules. We kinda assumed stuff for multiple rerolls, modified throws < 1,and a few other things but not all of them worked out.

[@deckerCKY]

Df7 is possible, but you can't start with df7.

[@project_swift]

The League that we are starting shortly, the Organisers are giving every team a free 3x Dedicated Fans. I don't like it because I think it gives a boost to late league teams that need to buy more positionals down the track. What do you think?

[@Bucket_Boy101]

Also I have won 3 straight games with my chaos team (1 pre-season friendly, 2 main season) and I have DF4 now. My final normal season game is against a skaven team who have DF5 but have won one less game, as they bought them when they started. I bought my Mino after the last game and he bought a R-Ogre. It's going to be a good match.

[@kellydavis3108]

Insert Zach Galifianakis math GIF here.

[@_Fabien_B]

On average, DF will always be worth the money you put in it. If you are very unlucky though, +1DF and +2DF could make you lose money (only losses and roll 1s on fans), but that's very unlikely. But as you said in the video, DF is not worth not taking a positional, so my conclusion is: take the best starting roster as you can, and then see how much money you still have. If you play a fragile team that can win easily, keep your money to buy an apo after game 1. If you play a solid team, invest all you have left in DF and at the end of the season it will be worth the investment

[@Bucket_Boy101]

So my inference from this is that teams that score more and therefore win more are more likely to both accrue and maintain DF. From this it can therefore be stated that buying as much DF for them as you can is best so that you can replace players and potentially buy any big guys or other expensive positionals.

[@jeremyrobinson1611]

So the optimal league build is 1 ac and 1df

[@patpaints9813]

I might have it wrong since I'm reading a French rulebook, but Dedicated Fans don't count towards Team Value, right? So for stunty teams and their Worthless Linemen (not the official term I know) who deflate TV to make sure they get inducements, maybe it's worth putting more money in DF than a positional that counts towards TV?

[@JorisVDC]

DF 5 is possible given the fact that going up on a win at DF 4 is 4+. But yeah, basically I would prefer as much positionals at the start of the season and maybe dump leftover cash into DF. I would still rather save up for an apoth on most teams though. Except bash teams because they score less TD's.

[@godlaydying]

Doesn't this rule encourage "OK, you've obviously won. Let's take turns scoring to get our winnings up."?

[@ThanatoselNyx]

Collusion was always possible for SPPs anyway. In a friendly league you should be able to trust most people not to cheat.

[@adrianscott4288]

I think you've made this way more complicated than it needs to be. DF is an investment that will almost always turn a profit. Basically if DF doesn't change then you'll break even on that investment after 2 games, then profit after 3. In the worst case scenario you lose your DF after games 1 & 2, but even then you're still only losing money after 3 games if you spent 20k or less on extra DF. But the dice rolls required for that is pretty unlikely. In short, I think it's always worth spending as much as you can on DF, just so long as you're not compromising what you spend on your team!

[@BritainsHiddenHistoryRoss]

I agree regarding the first half of the video. However it makes sense in the second half where Ben explains the opportunity cost of putting money into DF. E. G. If the 40k you put into DF means you can't afford the blitzer you might miss out on a win and more TDs. The TDs alone are worth 10k each and as Ben points out the 40k "upgrade" to a blitzer at the start will cost you 90k later to buy the whole piece.

[@deckerCKY]

I think your math is off in terms of break even (reaching df4), because (for example), df6 can go up on a 6 with a win or not go down on a loss with a 6 (meaning you have ~1/3 chance of getting a 6 on the win or loss on each 3 game set). The same can happen slowing you down when you start with low dedicated fans before you break even. Another thing you didn't really mention is that dedicated fans don't add to team value, giving you more/better inducements. I think a difference of 1 positional upgrade is a lot less than 1 TD per game (probably closer to 1 TD per 3 game set, recognizing that the extra dedicated fans will replace that positional within the first 3 game set.

[@deckerCKY]

Btw, without running the numbers, I think the break even would be closer to 4 sets of 3 rather than 3 sets of 3.