First Look: Fury Football RECHARGED, Draft Mode
Dread meets Boom: our first experience with Fury Football’s RECHARGED “Draft Mode” was a lot of fun!
As you may know from watching our YouTube streams, we're getting ready to re-charge our PLAAY NOW Fury Football universe. The goal was to maintain the play value of the original card set, while adding a dash of freshness and fun for a NEW series of action. In brain-storming this, we're introducing a cool new multi-player campaign element. Originally, I saw the multi-player idea as sort of a "value-added" feature. But after trying it out myself (with Sam), I'm super enthused about the possibilities. I think it may become more of a draw for this release than the update of the existing teams!
In the campaign version, each person operates under a salary cap of 25 million dollars. The player cards are marked with each player's salary value, anywhere from 0 to 10. (Yes, that's correct--some rookie players don't count against the salary cap.) It's kind of like the way it works in real pro ball, where you have to have a core of cheap, young players to flesh out your roster. More on this shortly...
We printed the cards and spread them out on the kitchen table. There are 72 "mercenary" (the Fury term for free agent) cards in the set, we grouped them by position: star backs, backs and line. (There are a few players listed as line/back players, we set them aside in their own group.) Then we began. Sam chose first, picking star back Jamale Brewer, a "value" pick at $4 million. My first choice, I went for defense and chose rookie lineman Smack Shimada ($6 million). We surprised each other: neither of us chose the top-rated player in the mercenary pool, Star Back Vince Coloassal, who starred last season for the Sydney Gargantuans and is demanding $10 million per year.
We alternated choices, sixteen picks in all for each of us. By just the third or fourth pick, things started to get interesting. I chose lineman Leon Toxic ($6 million) to anchor my offensive line, and then made Gunner Kilcrease ($5 million) my choice as star back. That put me at $16 million for my first three players, leaving only $9 million for the remaining thirteen players on my roster. Sam was a little more moderate, choosing modestly-priced veteran mercenaries like Bum Bagley and Puma Warren (remember him from last year's Big Fury Six series and the New Orleans Big Fun, where his late pass interference call against the Minnesota Chill ultimately kept New Orleans out of the playoffs?).
I had run out of cash by the end of the seventh round, so my final nine choices were all "free" rookies. I wound up with three rookie starters on both offense and defense, and all of my backups. Sam only had six rookies on his entire team.
Per the campaign rules, with a two-player game it's a best-of-three series to determine the champion. Borrowing from our Poke-Bowl theme decks, my team was called "The Boom," Sam's was called "The Dread."
First game, the Boom won 25-17 thanks largely to Dread penalties. My offense, with Kilcrease at star back, could not get out of its own way, but fortunately I scored points on each of the first three possessions on Dread penalties. 17-17 heading into the fourth possession, Kilcrease finally generated a touchdown on a long run, and we got a 2-point conversion, then held off the Dread for the win.
Second game, Brewer was unstoppable for the Dread, running for three touchdowns as Sam's team surged to a 38-6 lead. But Shimada proved his worth as a top draft pick by sacking Brewer for a safety/touchdown, and then we got a eleven more points on two conversions, suddenly it was 38-23. Final possession, Toxic created time for a Kilcrease touchdown pass! We went for the ten point conversion and the win--but only got six markers. Final score, Dread 38, Boom 29.
That set up a winner-take-all game three--gotta love it! We opened with a fumble--UGH!! The Dread cashed in by driving for a touchdown, but no conversion points. Second possession, we scored (Kilcrease spring on a big block from Kogan Higham ), but no conversion points. 6-6 at the half. We traded touchdowns for the third possession, but Brewer scampered in three times on short conversions (3, 3 and 2 points) for a 20-12 Dread lead. I couldn't get anything going on my final possession, so that's the way it ended. The Dread wins the first-ever Fury Football campaign game.
Some observations...
First of all, it was lots of fun! The draft portion took only about 20 minutes--it will probably go even faster next time, now that we are familiar with the players and have our favorites. (Already knew that the games themselves are fast, furious and fun, and that was borne out as well!)
There are lots of star backs who will get left out of your action. There are nineteen star backs in the mercenary group, but just like in the NFL, star backs are more expensive for what you get. Therefore, realistically, you can only afford one of them who's very good. You'll need to get another one or two in case of injury. But you better hope your starter doesn't go down!
I was delighted by how the player value feature replicates the "feel" of trying to manage the salary cap! Player value is paramount, and sometimes (often?) a "0" player is a better value than a "3" or "4" player. And yet, the "0" players aren't good enough that you could field a full team of them and be competitive. So you are forced to pick and choose who you want to have as your veteran (or, in some case, can't-miss rookie) starts are going to be, and then surround them with "value" players.
As GM and coach, you definitely get attached to your players! Or in some cases (are you listening Gunner Kilcrease?), put off by them! In my inaugural three-game series, I found myself frustrated with Kilcrease's limitations. (Side note, I did upgrade him a bit for the final release.) On the other hand, I felt like a genius for inserting rookie star back Traxton Tristler on defense, where his liabilities suddenly became assets. He made big plays in both games two and three. Good calls and bad, you really feel like you have some say-so in how your team is built and performs.
I mentioned Traxton Tristler, if you've played Fury Football, you know that (by design) bit's difficult for a player to be "bad," the worst you can be is "mediocre." This has some interesting implications, where you sometimes don't really realize a player's value until you put him on the game board and watch him play. One of my lineman--my last draft pick, as a matter of fact--Job Blaugha. On the pass he's 50/50 touchdown or sack; on the run he's 50/50 touchdown or fumble. I was thinking maybe I'd use him in a pinch on offense. I wound up putting him in on defense, though, after an injury, where he forced a fumble that set me up for the go-ahead touchdown in game one. Basically, he's got the potential to be a game-changer, for good OR bad!
I think this is going to be a really fun set to play with. Just playing this first series, I'm already wanting to take the Boom as-drafted and run them against a series of established Fury League teams, just to see how I can do! We're sending this set off to the printer this afternoon--won't be long until you can try it out, too!