WXV 2014 Rule Changes: Open Forum

[JBs-Hawks]

Love em all other than gamble and bank!

[Toga]

Interchange is a good point Toga, these position strategies in my mind are for:
- people who want to take that extra advantage against an opponent they think will be close
- people, who for a series of unlucky events, find themselves short in a position (multiple injuries/suspensions happening at once)


Positive response, what I think I'll do is send all these ideas for a vote and see where we end up.

Good points Oz, I think the OOP argument is probably strong enough for the positional ideas to work then. ;)

[Boomz]

So... nobody panic... I'm just mentioning some ideas for maybe 2015.... Well, even 2014 if people are really keen.

I was wondering how we could bring some more tactics/coaching into this game... Some ideas I've been thinking of:


- 'Resting' players. Each week, if you want, you can choose one player to 'rest'. (Excluding finals)

This player can't play that week (but must play an AFL game), and the week after they score with a 10% bonus. Example, Buenos Aires rest Dane Swan against Beijing in Round 2. In round 3, Swan scores 110 points, plus a bonus 10%, equal 121. I like this idea as I think it has the combined impact of risk and giving the weaker teams a greater chance of victory.

- 'Bank' a players score. Bank a player's score this round, for next round instead. (Excluding finals)

For example, Sam Mitchell is taking on Creepy Crowley in the AFL in Round 12. You want his score in Round 11 to count for him. So you choose to rest Mitchell for Round 11 (before he plays), and have his score count in Round 12 instead. This again adds an element of tactics and risk.

- 'Gamble' on a players performance for a round. Bet on one player bettering there projected score from the SC website. (Excluding finals)

Dayne Beams is projected to get 110 on the SC website. You think he can do better than that. You gamble on him to do that - win the gamble, and get an extra 40 points, lose the gamble and lose 40 points.

- 'Co-Captains' - not sure on who to select as Captain this week? Pick both! (Including finals)

Tossing up between Jack Steven and Nat Fyfe as a captain this week? Choose both! Each get 1.5 times there score, and if one doesn't play, the other gets regular captain bonus (2 times score). So no need for a Vice.

- 'Substitute' - Any player subbed (green sub or red sub in first half), is replaced with an emergency (including finals).

A risky proposition if you choose to use it! Great if a player doesn't get on the field until the 4th quarter or is injured after 2 minutes, terrible if they score 100+ as the green sub.... If an emergency is also a sub, the original player in the XV stays.

- 'Flood' - 3 times a year, you can use your 'flood' strategy. (Excluding finals)

You can name 5 defenders and 3 forwards. Instead of 4 defenders and 4 forwards.

- 'Attack' - 3 times a year, you can use your 'attack' strategy. (Excluding finals)

You can name 3 defenders and 5 forwards. Instead of 4 defenders and 4 forwards.

- 'Go Tall' - 3 times a year, you can use your 'Go Tall' strategy. (Excluding finals)

You can name 2 rucks and 3 midfielders, instead of 1 ruck and 4 midfielders.

- 'Go Small' - 3 times a year, you can use your 'Go small' strategy. (Excluding finals)

You can name 5 midfielders, and no specialist ruck, instead of 1 ruck and 4 midfielders.

Not a fan of resting, bank, and gamble but the rest I like. Especially the positional strategies.

[CrowsFan]

Ok here's my opinions on the different suggestions...

Resting
I like it in theory, but in reality I just don't see it working properly. Stronger teams will be able to 'rest' a player against a weak team if they are then playing a strong team the following week, but weak teams can't really do this, which just widens the gap between the best and the worst. Considering you are meant to be aiming to win every game a strong team would have the capability to win against a weak team even with 'resting' a player, but doesn't really work for the weak teams. Obviously they would like to have a player 'rested' when they come up against a similar rating side, but that means leaving their best player out against a strong team the week before, and couldn't you really construe that as a form of tanking? Since they're not playing the side most capable of getting a win?

Bank
I'm not a fan of this at all. Who a player is facing off against each week is just luck of the draw. Messing around to say that a players round 10 score can count in round 11 isn't right in my opinion.

Gamble
Agree with others that this rule is not good. As they have said the SC projections are usually so random. Getting bonus points for a 50/50 guess isn't a good thing.

Co-captains
I'm not opposed to this, but that's mainly because if you choose the correct sole captain you are going to score more than picking co-captains, therefore you're not actually getting an advantage over the other team by picking 2. I'm not a fan of getting bonus points as you can see with my opinions on bank and gamble, but this doesn't give you bonus points so it's fine by me.

Substitute
I like this rule. Imagine losing the grand final because you lost a player in the first minute of the match. I'm assuming though the sub has to be of the same position as the player he replaces?

Flood & Attack
Don't mind these rules, think they can work well if used right. Obviously helps counter problems when you only have 3 players named in a position for that round.

Go Small or Tall
I don't like these ones however. Basically I don't think a team should be able to go in to a game without naming a ruckman. If that happened in the AFL the team would get decimated at the stoppages. Since this is meant to be realistic the same thought goes here. Obviously if a team doesn't have a ruck named for them they have to play a guy OOP, resulting in a loss in points, which reflects how they would go without a ruck playing.

Anyway they are my thoughts on the issues. Resting, Co-captain, Sub and Flood/Attack are not bad and deserve some more discussion, the others I don't think should go ahead.

[Purple 77]

I like:
Resting, Co-Captains, Substitute

I don't like:
Bank, Gamble, Positional Strategies


I sort of think half the challenge and half of what makes a good team is being able to play 4,4,1,4,2. It means that in their recruiting methods, they saw what positions need addressing and what positions could be traded out. If you end up not having 4 (quality) forwards or 4 (quality) defenders most weeks, then, well, you should suffer the consequences for bad preparation. I know injuries are an exception for this, which is why I would settle for Flood or Attack strategies, provided you only have 3 forwards/defenders available to play.

Think I like the Substitute rule the best.

[CrowsFan]

Seems like we are pretty much on the same wavelength purps. Agree that the flood/attack should only be allowed if you can't name 4 players in that position. If you can then you must name them

[Toga]

Resting
I like it in theory, but in reality I just don't see it working properly. Stronger teams will be able to 'rest' a player against a weak team if they are then playing a strong team the following week, but weak teams can't really do this, which just widens the gap between the best and the worst. Considering you are meant to be aiming to win every game a strong team would have the capability to win against a weak team even with 'resting' a player, but doesn't really work for the weak teams. Obviously they would like to have a player 'rested' when they come up against a similar rating side, but that means leaving their best player out against a strong team the week before, and couldn't you really construe that as a form of tanking? Since they're not playing the side most capable of getting a win?

But that's the point I think HB, if a strong team chooses to rest a gun against Beijing/NDT/whoever, that gives us more of a chance of pulling off an upset! ;)

[CrowsFan]

Resting
I like it in theory, but in reality I just don't see it working properly. Stronger teams will be able to 'rest' a player against a weak team if they are then playing a strong team the following week, but weak teams can't really do this, which just widens the gap between the best and the worst. Considering you are meant to be aiming to win every game a strong team would have the capability to win against a weak team even with 'resting' a player, but doesn't really work for the weak teams. Obviously they would like to have a player 'rested' when they come up against a similar rating side, but that means leaving their best player out against a strong team the week before, and couldn't you really construe that as a form of tanking? Since they're not playing the side most capable of getting a win?

But that's the point I think HB, if a strong team chooses to rest a gun against Beijing/NDT/whoever, that gives us more of a chance of pulling off an upset! ;)

Yeah but at the same time you're more likely to rest against the strong team so you get an advantage the following week. Effectively tanking that game and giving the strong team the win even though they rest a player

[Nige]

Resting
I like it in theory, but in reality I just don't see it working properly. Stronger teams will be able to 'rest' a player against a weak team if they are then playing a strong team the following week, but weak teams can't really do this, which just widens the gap between the best and the worst. Considering you are meant to be aiming to win every game a strong team would have the capability to win against a weak team even with 'resting' a player, but doesn't really work for the weak teams. Obviously they would like to have a player 'rested' when they come up against a similar rating side, but that means leaving their best player out against a strong team the week before, and couldn't you really construe that as a form of tanking? Since they're not playing the side most capable of getting a win?

But that's the point I think HB, if a strong team chooses to rest a gun against Beijing/NDT/whoever, that gives us more of a chance of pulling off an upset! ;)

Yeah but at the same time you're more likely to rest against the strong team so you get an advantage the following week. Effectively tanking that game and giving the strong team the win even though they rest a player

Oh no... not the 'T' word!  :o

[Toga]

Yeah but at the same time you're more likely to rest against the strong team so you get an advantage the following week. Effectively tanking that game and giving the strong team the win even though they rest a player

To be honest when I said I was a fan of the resting rule I didn't even think about any of us weaker teams using it all that much, more of a weapon for the competition's big dogs.

[Master Q]

Mega coach Q here.

Say Thunder are playing Dublin followed by a mid table team, idk say PNL.... Realistically very unlikely we will win the game vs Dublin, so we rest our guns, and then we have a massive boost against PNL the following week.

Do you encourage this tactic Os?

[ossie85]

Mega coach Q here.

Say Thunder are playing Dublin followed by a mid table team, idk say PNL.... Realistically very unlikely we will win the game vs Dublin, so we rest our guns, and then we have a massive boost against PNL the following week.

Do you encourage this tactic Os?

You only can rest 1 player. Its a calculated risk, which would be in the rules, but I wouldnt encourage any particular tactic but I do encourage tactics.

[ossie85]

Email sent to everyone asking for a vote - only the 6 replies so far, but early days.

Obviously no rules have been approved or rejected yet, but its pretty clear for some which will eventually be approved/rejected already.


In regards to:

Resting
Stronger teams will be able to 'rest' a player against a weak team if they are then playing a strong team the following week, but weak teams can't really do this, which just widens the gap between the best and the worst. Considering you are meant to be aiming to win every game a strong team would have the capability to win against a weak team even with 'resting' a player, but doesn't really work for the weak teams. Obviously they would like to have a player 'rested' when they come up against a similar rating side, but that means leaving their best player out against a strong team the week before, and couldn't you really construe that as a form of tanking? Since they're not playing the side most capable of getting a win?

That's the way I see it working - strong teams resting players against weak teams. I see that lessening the gap between weak and strong teams, not widening it.

You are correct weak teams can't really do this - but as Q points out, weak teams can still rest players against strong teams, but if that increases there likelihood of winning the next week against another weaker team, I don't see that as tanking.

In my mind, tanking is done when people are trying to take advantage of drafts/other rules and basically not trying to win. Yes, you're right this could lead to teams tactically being weaker for certain games, but they would then be tactically stronger for the next game...

In AFL, say Hawthorn resting players against GWS wouldn't be seen as tanking. Or the Gold Coast not risking Gary Ablett for certain games also not seen as tanking (in my opinion, Ross Lyon's tactic of resting half his team on the eve of finals should be seen as tanking, but that's an extreme)

[ossie85]

We've had 9 of 18 coaches vote so far....

And one rule has an impressive 9/9 record, and I'm not gonna vote against it, so it gets approved!

From 2014 - CO-CAPTAINS will occur!

[ossie85]

10 coaches have voted, and the Substitute rule now has a 9-1 record - enough to get it approved!

More detail on Substitute rule:

- Coaches choose before the round starts whether they want to use it or not.

- If they use it, any player who starts with a green vest, or is red vested in the first half, will be replaced by an emergency.

- Standard emergency rules apply, and can only be replaced by an emergency in the same position.

- If no suitable emergency is available, instead of having a player OOP, the player WILL NOT be substituted and the sub score stands. (Heath Shaw is red vested in first half, but you don't have an interchange/emergency to replace him in defense, so his score stands)

- If an emergency is also subbed, they won't come in as a sub

- A substituted player will have its score counted towards the Reserve team.