I Think Vol. 2

hiausd · Post by **hiausd** » 13-01-2005 10:28

Like I said in I Think Vol.1 I haven't played in a while so I don't know what people are doing these days, this is just more DB philosophy.

It's similar to what Davidm was talking about in my last post.

re: Ideal DB Formation
My ideal DB 'formation' since 1.3 has always been a 2 defense 3 offense formation, but I was never able to convince people to do it. When people started boosting back then I felt that the keeper position could eventually become obsolete if people would step up on D. If there were 2 very good defenders, then why would a keep ever be needed? As long as every man on the opposing team stays was covered, then there would be no offensive openings.

The first defender would just zone the goal; making sure that no weak, easy shots got into the goal while also covering when advantageous to do so. The second defender would just be a cover man, making sure nobody gets open. For every other threatening opponent the offense would just boost back to cover.

So then what you end up having, assuming the other team has a keep and defender, is around 4 defenders against 3 offense. With good defenders+boosting this is easy to defend against, even if they brought 4 people on offense.

Red is opponent attacker
Blue is defender

^^^^
As you see from the picture above, there is always one defender harassing each offender and trying to intercept. But instead of a useless guy sitting in the keep, there is an extra defender in position to intercept any passes that could get around the other defenders.

I could expand on this more, but I think it'd be easier if I had something to respond to :p

Of course in really advanced states ideally there would be multiple formations to counter the other team's formation. i.e. an offense overload would probably have the best chance against the above formation...Then you switch to counter the opponent's new formation...But anyway that's all too complicated for the current state of DB.

nameless · Post by **nameless** » 13-01-2005 11:00

i don t want to loose my job :\o/:

Tho often i feel useless standing on the line, watching the volleys passing me left and right ...

`Ghost` · Post by **`Ghost`** » 13-01-2005 11:53

reading that I thought you were my long lost brother nameless

fro · Post by **fro** » 13-01-2005 11:55

i dont think it will ever get that far, but iv been impressed with some keepers using their initiative and dodging out to grab/intercept passes (lag permitting). Tho this idea is good, its too easy to break it, as the majority of attackers are poor at defensive marking/boosting which weakens the strength of the d.

Throwing players forward is a risky game, its too easy to reduce the efficiency of attackers boosting back to make it viable in the long run

Onge · Post by **Onge** » 13-01-2005 12:37

fro wrote: Tho this idea is good, its too easy to break it, as the majority of attackers are poor at defensive marking/boosting which weakens the strength of the d.

This is where the whole problem lies - but how do you encourage more to take defence seriously? Without some added incentive to defend more the problem will never go away.

Post by **DavidM** » 13-01-2005 12:49

problem 1: people are too ignorant to accept that they all need to be allrounders. so they all stick to one position. there are few who are good at def and at att. you never see the top attackers "!add d" in a pickup, which they badly need. not mentioning names

and most of the top defs can do shit in attack

well, keeper standing on the line is, to me, outdated for years now, but it's still there for some reason. keeper needs to be the boss of the team, the others rotating, the keeper coming out a lot.......and, as i said in the other thread, building a boost package with someone else in midfield, so you either boost the def to the flying ball or something, or you boost the keeper back in goal.
"boost packages" as i call them would be awesome for def and intercepting,but never used. people just boost each other when they randomly get the opportunity to, but they don't enforce the situation.
a lot can be done, its work on the very limit, but with some practice a team would get save with that, and could badly own all current top teams with their limited tactics IMO

Maegrim · Post by **Maegrim** » 13-01-2005 13:19

DavidM wrote: you never see the top attackers "!add d" in a pickup, which they badly need. not mentioning names

Fragger · Post by **Fragger** » 13-01-2005 13:32

So in other words, we can blame attack?

edit: no seriously, when im keeping im not just a keep.Im also a sweeper, some players cover me when i need to do something(intercepting a player/ball) but most of them look at the sky and when the other team scores all u hear is ¨come on keep¨

Wibble · Post by **Wibble** » 13-01-2005 13:52

David, you obviously haven't seen AoV play recently. We actively use boosting to intercept in all directions, and I consider us one of the best teams at this tactic. I'm not saying we do everything you describe in your post, but this is certainly one thing that _IS_ out there.

Post by **DavidM** » 13-01-2005 15:15

haven't seen much recently, but then you seem to be the only team doing what I have in mind

R3L!K · Post by **R3L!K** » 13-01-2005 15:46

imo, nothing that is being said here is 'new' in anyway.

Passive keepers have always been the sign of a poorly organised team.

These have always been the keeper's responsibilities (aside from making direct saves):

1. Boosting players where needed

2. Marking lone strikers within a certain range of the penalty zone - so the sweep can concentrate on intercepting passes and adaptive defensive duties
-----

Something I discussed with catalyst years ago was the idea of fully rotating team.... including the keeper position.

There are occasions when the keeper will end up 1/3rd the way up the pitch or further because their team is on the offense and it makes sense to move forward for quicker ball retrieval.

When an attacker dies... they should become the keep and the previous keeper keep moving forward and join the midfield. This kind of cover is obvious but rarely happens.

As DavidM says, it requires a team full of all rounders and I believe there are enough players around capable of this.

The idea of strict formations is nonsense - players have to learn to think quickly and be adaptive - unfortunately people who consider themselves specialists in one particular position will always be a handicap.

priior · Post by **priior** » 13-01-2005 15:50

most keepers i know (from NA side) play defense in their pbox.. up until someone is about to shoot.

as long as theyd ont boost the d out of position.. it;s all good

Messy · Post by **Messy** » 13-01-2005 15:53

As others have said, this is the way most euro games are played anyway

(I'm afraid to say I have no idea on NA ones

)

The keeper is in the pzone however, but does dodge out.

As for a team of all-rounders, AoV is the only team I've seen that comes close /o\

edit: ah..priior posting while I was writing mine up just pretty much filled me in on the NA part.

Seems like everyone has started using your idea hiausd

hiausd · Post by **hiausd** » 13-01-2005 17:36

I don't think a team of "all-rounders" would have an advantage over specialized teams unless they were perfect at every position, but that's unlikely. That kind of a team would still beat a lot of good teams, but against a team that's organized very well I think they'd be at a disadvantage. There's always someone who's worse than someone else and you'd want your best people doing what they do best.

It's the same kind of specialization seen in other areas of life...You can have 3 bachelor's degrees or 1 phd and the phd is valued higher. When you specialize in 1 area you can do it better than if you were doing 3 different things.

And I don't think people are really doing the same thing I'm talking about..Because it's not the same as having an 'active keeper'; my thing has no one that stays next to the keep, just defenders. It goes on the belief that good defenders can substitute the job of keeper..and the only time you would need to revert is if they get close.

It's a little more complicated than the picture, but It's pretty hard to translate my vision without making lots pictures :p

^^^^^
The extra defender isn't always just zoning the keep, he only zones when he needs to be safe...The rest of the time he's pushing double teams on the offense.

^^^^^
In this situation the offense would eventually be forced to pass back, because every man is covered including a double cover(Which can be on either attacker). Depending on how the offense moves, the extra man could either zone, keep the double, or do a little of both. Unless the opposing keeper comes on full offense, the attacking team doesn't really have options other than to rely on a defensive mistake.

All of this assumes that the team is efficient and the defenders are good. If not, of course this would not work :p

Wibble · Post by **Wibble** » 13-01-2005 18:21

I think that the idea of a rotating team is in theory a good one. On the occasions where I've played this system with David and a few others in organised teams its worked okay. What I think works better is being flexible though, assessing the situation and no rigidly following rotation ALL the time. In this way you get a compromise between the advantages that full rotation gives you, and those of having the best people in each position