Note - I only play SC, but everything below is relevant to DT as well. Long story short, I feel that SC/DT is unneccessarily luck-intensive due to the following factors: 1. Subs - you effectively have to take a stab in the dark as to who will or won't be a sub after lockout. If the game is on a wednesday/thurdsday or friday at least you know who's going to be a sub before lockout. 2. Late withdrawals - as per point 1. I don't feel that this was as much of an issue before the introduction of subs, as you would generally have emergencies to cover this. But this and subs and more likely than not you're going to get caught out during the weekend. 3. Injuries during the game which result in a player being subbed - this may be perception bias, but there seems to be a helluva lot more game-ending injuries during a match than before, due to both the concussion rule and the insane intensity in contested ball situations. Which in turn lead to a higher likelihood of "late withdrawals" before the next game. 4. Bloody multi-bye rounds. It baffles me why they didn't keep the 33-player format from last year - by reducing the amount of players you almost have to burn trades to stay competitive in the multi-bye rounds and avoid donuts. So what can be done about it? I have a few suggestions: 1. Bring back the 33-player format - would definitely help for the multi-bye rounds. 2. Increase the amount of emergencies you can select from 3 to 7 - 2 for fwd/mid/def and one for rucks. 3. If an emergency scores more than a player on the ground, use the emergency's score where possible instead, ie. if there's 1 or 2 lower scores on the ground than the emergencies, use the higher or both emergency scores instead where applicable. This would reduce the chances of being caught out with a crap score due to circumstances beyond your control (late withdrawal, sub on/off or injury during the game), yet still maintain a bit of team nous being required when selecting which players to have as emergencies. I know that solution 3 also counters against a player just having a crap game if none of your players are subbed/injured, but everyone will be able to take advantage of it. I love this game, and I'm sure there are plenty of wiser heads with better ideas out there, so sound off below!
The luck is also the skill. If you upped the bench most teams would be the same. Pick a player prone to injury, tough luck, plan better. Injuries force you to be more creative in order to succeed. In short getting rid of the security blanket of 3 bench is a good thing. Fact is with gc and gws we have had it easy picking rookies. The game does need challenges and I think the mix is pretty good currently.
The multi bye rounds is nothing new for those who play NRL fantasy football. It adds a good element of strategy and planning. Also if you had 7 emergencies, there would not be enough variation between people's scores. In the past few years, the game has become more homogeneous as it is, anything that makes teams look more the same and stifles creativity and risk is not good.
The AFL should mandate that the teams nominate their subs on a Friday evening when final Sunday teams are lodged. Apart from that i agree with Lucas, the frustration/challenges add that bit of extra intrigue to the game.
Suck it up i reckon. Its all part of the fun of fantasy games. I even heard people suggest we should have rolling lockouts for entire weekend so we can change team for late changes...
Only introduction I would like is a Sub. If the teams can have one so should we. 1 player, in addition to the 3 emergencies. He can be activated anytime before he plays, for any other player, regardless of position. His position, by the same voodoo the clubs use would become that of the guys we subs for. The player subbed out has his score zeroed for that team. /2c
I think we're better off without a sub because we still have 22 players scoring instead of 21 and a sub. I won't say that the dt/sc format doesn't require changes but I'm not in favour of any of the ones posted. We all have to cop players being subbed injured etc. Just cop it on the chin and work to minimise your the damage.
I think the games fine. The rules are the same for everyone and as such so are the challengers. I think going forward G'n'R will probably start to slide over the next few seasons with teams that pick the correct mid-pricers being the ones to beat. They'll be able to save trades by not having to correct. Teams that started with Hayes, reiwoldt, Masten, Tippet etc may not have to burn as many trades if the players can hold their form. Would be good to know the sub in advance, but how many trades would be wasted to remove the player. Just like the actual game, leave the rules alone. Still sh1ts me that the AFL did everything they could to speed the game up as a spectacle and now they're changing rules to slow it down. When a game is red hot we've got the best product in the world, stop changing it! I'll stop ranting now
In reality in the last few years we have had it easy, sure the sub and the late withdrawls are a pain in the ass but next year there wont be a plethora of rookies we can pick knowing full well they will be playing regardless!
Next year, unless they change the on-field numbers will almost certainly be the death of GnR. And thank god for that, way too many cookie cutters, I have been in matchups where we had 2-3 players different. Looking forward to picking from the whole field again.
The main problem I have with the format this year is the that leagues now consist of 18 teams, instead of the old 16 teams. This has made them have to make the multi-bye rounds be included in the league season, when this could have easily be avoided. If they had left it at only 16 teams per league, the season could have been formatted like this: Rnd 1 - No league matches Rnds 2-10 - Normal league matches Multi-bye rnds 11-13 - No league matches Rnds 14-19 - Normal league matches Rnds 20-23 - Finals So in summary, there would be 4 rnds (including the multi-byes) where there were no league matches, 15 rounds of league matches so that you played each other team in your league once & 4 rnds of finals. This would've made much more sense IMO.
I'd just like to see a rule whereby if one of your on ground players gets the green vest, then that player is automatically substituted for your emergency. Simple If the emergency is a sub as well, then nothing would move This is only the green vest. Red vest would just play out as normal.
2 things i think!! 1. Subs, should be nominated when team sheets come out, (got stung with smith this week on the field and also slow burning cow of smedts is now usless after his sub effected score!!)marcus dont mind your suggestion!! 2. Didnt realise that in the bye rounds 11-13 there is no league matches, (this has really pissed me off!!) as somone who has planned and traded players around the bye rounds i think it is unfair that someone who doesnt plan or do there research can get away with leaving a field of doughnuts and not be penalised, was looking foward to these rounds but couldnt care less now!! So much for needing a bit of skill or foward thinking to win leagues!! Especially if you have cash leagues!! Can load up backline of goodard, fisher , newman , delido , scotland , etc without penalty.
good to know guys , hadnt looked just gone on the info above!! So it should aswell, probably lose them all now!!
I said last year, and still believe this, that we, the SC players, need an option to carry a sub into a game. What this would do is allow us to cover late withdrawals, but also cover people who are perhaps subbed in or out. The rules would have to be strict - for example, a sub would only come into play if there is an injury or a late withdrawl, or a situation where someone is subbed out. I do apologise, because I put up a better argument when I suggested this last year (in a rush at the moment). But I strongly believe us having one nominated sub who can replace someone's score in extreme circumstances should be an option.
I agree a lot of these suggestions would be handy, but it won't ever happen, it would complicate things for the average player & would mostly benefit the serious, any rule changes will be to even out the comp, to simplify and newbify things, such as reversible trades.