Elven Union Catcher level up advice

[SRPJ]

This is my first elven union/ pro elf team.

I have a catcher which rolled a double so I gave him guard. But he has rolled another double again!
since he has already got guard im unsure what to give him.

my other catcher has guard aswell.

I have 2 catchers at the moment and Im yet to get another 2 catchers as it is only a begining team.

any advice would be great thanks

SRPJ

[licker34]

This is the only player I would ever suggest taking dump off on, but dump off is what I would suggest.

[DarthPhysicist]

I might go Mighty Blow. Pelf catchers are nicely built into blitzers and having guard already, I might build on it.

[skydancer]

On first double u had to take mb on catcher :D They're your hitter. :D
Now i would skip the double.

[avaririot]

I put MB on mine. There's no guarantee a blitzer will roll it and catchers are next best positional for it.

[licker34]

I'm telling you, dump off is the correct double skill for a pro catcher.

[licker34]

Also should note that EU catchers are pretty bloaty to begin with. Especially with multiple doubles, and guard is a great and all, but meh, elfs don't need that much of it before it does just bloat them.

I might actually just fire him.

But still, dump off is the correct skill. And that's 100% serious. Makes an almost impossible to stop scoring combination.

[licker34]

Ok man, good to know!

[Hairy Coo]

I honestly dont think building a catcher around dump-off is a good idea. DE Runner is a very questionable player and even on him Pass would be better than NOS. It is a very niche skill for when you cant protect your carrier (from leaping sacks for example, so it might be worth it in elf heavy leagues). In COL/CCL I'd just take mb on the first double and now I'd be considering PO. Right now it is jsut a bloat, skip for dodge.

[skydancer]

Yeah only serius thing to do now as u taken Guard is going for dodge.

[licker34]

Originally posted by Hairy Coo:

I honestly dont think building a catcher around dump-off is a good idea. DE Runner is a very questionable player and even on him Pass would be better than NOS. It is a very niche skill for when you cant protect your carrier (from leaping sacks for example, so it might be worth it in elf heavy leagues). In COL/CCL I'd just take mb on the first double and now I'd be considering PO. Right now it is jsut a bloat, skip for dodge.

However...

DE do not have multiple nerves of steel players.

Seriously, two EU catchers, one (or both) with dump off means 2+ pass and 2+ (with reroll) catch, and if you position it correctly you can sometimes avoid the interception roll, or at worst, you require the other team to commit more players before the blitz than they may want to.

If you are going that build, and it's a very interesting build for a team that probably should use it anyway, because they kind of don't have anything else going for them, a 2nd double on a catcher could even be pass to make it 2 1/36 rolls.

Now I know, I crap on pass and nerves of steel and dump off all the time, and that's because they are pretty blah skills to take on most teams which have other better options. EU though? I'm not sure that the other skills are de facto better for them. Of course guard and mighty blow are great skills, but EU is perhaps the best scoring team in the game, rather than shoring up a weakness, just double down on a strength.

That's my philosophy anyway.

If you've never seen or tried this build you might check it out. At first when I saw it (in a league against a team I played twice a season) I thought it was laughable. I was quickly disabused of that notion though, in the hands of a skilled elf coach who understands the weaknesses and strengths of the EU roster it turned a lot of games into draws or wins which otherwise looked pretty unlikely.

I also saw another team in another league I played in build a similar roster, and they also had success, constantly being in the playoffs and reaching the finals twice and winning once.

It's not a joke, it's a very effective way of leveraging your catchers with NoS, and it helps so much to control position when you are short players. And outside of Woodies, EU is going to be short players against more opponents than any other elf roster.

[Hairy Coo]

Licker, but NOS Dump-off only works when your carrier gets hit...and a catcher is like the only EU player that shouldnt me expooed becasue he is expensive and av7. So the build might even work, but how long the catcher is going to last? Plus it is a 2+ pass you can't reroll. So 1 out of 6 times he is gonna drop the ball regardless.

[licker34]

Originally posted by Hairy Coo:

Licker, but NOS Dump-off only works when your carrier gets hit...and a catcher is like the only EU player that shouldnt me expooed becasue he is expensive and av7. So the build might even work, but how long the catcher is going to last? Plus it is a 2+ pass you can't reroll. So 1 out of 6 times he is gonna drop the ball regardless.

It's not what you plan, but EU is an AV7 team... there will be times where you don't have the option but to have your guys get hit because you don't have enough of the rest of the team (and the linemen are slow compared to WE) to screen properly.

If you take guard instead, your catcher is going to get hit too though, at least somewhat more frequently than you would like, because there will be situations where the correct play is to base with guard and wind up having to eat a block the next turn.

You can also take pass on that catcher if you get a 2nd double. But yes, you should never expect your catchers to live super long, using dump off doesn't really change that. Only changes it if you wouldn't use the double in the first place. But, there's no reason this player won't have block and dodge at the same speed one would who took guard/MB. Faster probably actually, as the occasional dump off will also generate spp.

I don't really care about how long my players live though (within reason), improving my chances of winning a game matters more. And, if you play competitive leagues, you want the tools on your team to win knock out rounds. You can always rebuild the team after you win the championship ;)

[Hairy Coo]

Well fair enough, I would not take guard on the catcher to start with, it is just asking to be hit. Mb would be my first choice. With the OP setup I don't think that any double skill will redeem him

[licker34]

Originally posted by Hairy Coo:

Well fair enough, I would not take guard on the catcher to start with, it is just asking to be hit. Mb would be my first choice. With the OP setup I don't think that any double skill will redeem him

That's why I also suggested he fire him ;)

I might take MB on a catcher, but prefer it on a blitzer, especially as first skill. I rarely take more than one MB on any elf team (not counting a tree) anyway, seemingly the 2nd one rarely gets an opportunity to be used. At higher TVs it makes more sense though.

EU is a fun elf team because they encourage you to build differently than with HE or DE (WE are just different in the first place due to WDs). I think it's better to embrace strengths for most rosters though, which is why runners on DE aren't worth it, and HE are just bad because they have no real strength (other than passing, pukes) in the first place.

PE are the best scoring team in the game in my opinion, go all in on that aspect and enjoy the opponents frustration as they find it nearly impossible to actually stop your drives. Only nuffle can do that ;)

I've also seen solid EU builds that run no catchers at all, because they are so expensive and fragile. Those are clearly min/max teams though, rarely going to TVs over 1500, but at lower TVs they are almost like amazons with AG4.

[Street]

Elf blitzes have AV8 making them better guard players. Catchers are faster and therefore better for being the only MB on the team IMO as they can blitz to hit people and retreat to not be hit back after.