NRL Fantasy 2021 Part 91 times out of ten, Fifita scores that try

I missed Pene news altogether and forgot about Booth. Thanks both for the updates. Would think Booth has a reasonably good chance of being a starter at Titans. As the Storms 3rd best rake he’s probably in the top 5 in the NRL already amirite?

Jumping Marlin wrote:
Where do you see Hastings fitting in? (Before and after Doohie returns)

Brooks/Hastings starting halves?

Madge already showed his hand when he moved Doohie to the CTRs.

Hastings was going better than G Williams over there a couple of seasons back, so he could be enough to get the Tigers back to 9th. But also, Blake Austin was going better than G Williams too, so who knows really?

robelgordo wrote:

Brooks/Hastings starting halves?

Madge already showed his hand when he moved Doohie to the CTRs.

Hastings was going better than G Williams over there a couple of seasons back, so he could be enough to get the Tigers back to 9th. But also, Blake Austin was going better than G Williams too, so who knows really?

I'm really surprised that Madge didnt keep Doohie in the halves. Tigers looked much better with him there, has a great kicking game and owns the attack in the halves.

mattnz wrote:
I'm really surprised that Madge didnt keep Doohie in the halves. Tigers looked much better with him there, has a great kicking game and owns the attack in the halves.

He did get moved back to the halves by the end of the year, but will miss the first 2 months of next season due to knee surgery

Anyone else slightly amused at Soward's ladder predictions for 2022?
1. Panthers
2. Storm
3. Eagles
4. Roosters
5. Rabbits
6. Sharks
7. Dragons
8. Eels
9. Broncos
10.Knights
11.Titans
12. Raiders
13.Dogs
14. Warriors
15. Tigers
16. Cowboys

Hmm... showing a fair amount of previous team bias towards the Dragons there Soward old mate.
A team of ex-Broncos, mixed with some young guns who haven't had to maintain the intensity of a whole season is going to rank higher than the Eels??

My impressions:
I haver to agree with the top 5, although how the Bunnies transition to post-Bennet, and a new halves combination will be interesting.
Manly rode on Turbo's legs this year, but, teams will do more homework on him for 2022. Unless DCE & Foran start creating more without Tommy T, they will struggle to win as many games.
Roosters are almost an unknown package for 2022 - all depends on how Keary recovers from his ACL.
Storm will keep doing what they do, but without CS9, I still think there's a chink in their game when the semis roll-around. Munster is a drop-kick who can't control a game.
Panthers have it all to lose, but in 2022 they will be pushed every week by teams who get "up" for the game against them. One or two injuries and they won't go back-to-back.
I'm hoping the Knights may actually catch some luck on the injury front and have our spine intact for most of the year - an off-season in our system will make Clifford more effective, Gagai is the strike centre we need and hopefully he'll work with Best to bring out his "best" (see what I did there).
Sharks have a rookie head-coach, but have definitely bought quality players in.
Dogs have to improve and are my dark horse for the 8.

The Bludger

The Bludger wrote:Anyone else slightly amused at Soward's ladder predictions for 2022?
1. Panthers
2. Storm
3. Eagles
4. Roosters
5. Rabbits
6. Sharks
7. Dragons
8. Eels
9. Broncos
10.Knights
11.Titans
12. Raiders
13.Dogs
14. Warriors
15. Tigers
16. Cowboys

Hmm... showing a fair amount of previous team bias towards the Dragons there Soward old mate.
A team of ex-Broncos, mixed with some young guns who haven't had to maintain the intensity of a whole season is going to rank higher than the Eels??

My impressions:
I haver to agree with the top 5, although how the Bunnies transition to post-Bennet, and a new halves combination will be interesting.
Manly rode on Turbo's legs this year, but, teams will do more homework on him for 2022. Unless DCE & Foran start creating more without Tommy T, they will struggle to win as many games.
Roosters are almost an unknown package for 2022 - all depends on how Keary recovers from his ACL.
Storm will keep doing what they do, but without CS9, I still think there's a chink in their game when the semis roll-around. Munster is a drop-kick who can't control a game.
Panthers have it all to lose, but in 2022 they will be pushed every week by teams who get "up" for the game against them. One or two injuries and they won't go back-to-back.
I'm hoping the Knights may actually catch some luck on the injury front and have our spine intact for most of the year - an off-season in our system will make Clifford more effective, Gagai is the strike centre we need and hopefully he'll work with Best to bring out his "best" (see what I did there).
Sharks have a rookie head-coach, but have definitely bought quality players in.
Dogs have to improve and are my dark horse for the 8.

The Bludger

If Cleary is out the first couple of months the Panthers could find themselves with 2 wins from 8 games to start the season. Not the same team without him.

Agree on the top 5. Eels should be higher, even though they struggled towards the end of this season.

Just looking at the Fantasy end of year survey

One of the questions is about how often I used the "player comparisons" feature
Literally had no idea that was something that existed

Most of my stats I look at through a 3rd party website anyway, so don't use the fantasy site for much more than actually doing the trades

Also one of the survey options is purchasing extra trades for real $ through a coach payment

That is pretty much the worst thing they could do. Making the game pay to win will drive out many. many people

Jumping Marlin wrote:
Where do you see Hastings fitting in? (Before and after Doohie returns)

Think he'll be in the halves all season barring injury. Doueihi return as 14 or centre is my guess

Milchcow wrote:
Also one of the survey options is purchasing extra trades for real $ through a coach payment

That is pretty much the worst thing they could do. Making the game pay to win will drive out many. many people

Yeah that was the one option that would actually get me to not play.

No Worries wrote:So how about the new logo

I know there''s not alot of ways to draw a tiger but someone got paid to recolour the Apia Tigers junior soccer logo.

It's just Pascoe finding shit to do to divert attention from his litany of screw-ups
(plus they had money to spend after suddenly not having to give Madge a golden handshake)

Camo123 wrote:

Few of the answers look like they're taking hints from FPL which is a pretty good model

I think trades for loss of points works well which is one of things I nominated and would be good in backend when out of trades (would have to scale it fair bit higher than FPL, probably around 50 points loss for 1 trade)

If it's anything like dropping 50 points per trade, I'll take 4 trades right off the bat and start on -200 seven days a week thanks.
You want to amass around 25,000 points across a season, so that's dropping about 0.2% of your total points for 3% more trades each time you make that transaction.

Personally, I think managing trades is one of main fundamentals of the game - possibly the central strategy once you're clued up on good players etc - so I really don't like the idea of messing with trade numbers, buying trades, leveraging points for trades, or increasing max trades per round.

At present it seems to be at a good balance of being challenging, but enough trades to be workable and engaging.

I forgot to mention it in the survey (and I think they'd never do it), but I always liked the idea of one wildcard trade that you can use in addition to your round trades at any point in the season. Only one though, so it's not a major effect, but adds a little extra strategy.

filthridden wrote:Survey things to plug:

*Larger squad sizes (back to 25)
*Bring back ranked leagues

I put in a plug for an eliminator comp as well.  How hard can it be?

Agree with Easytiger. If they add in lots of extra trades or allow players to trade two every week, it'll take away a lot of the strategy and planning, even up the field, and reduce the enjoyment of the game for me.

easytiger wrote:

If it's anything like dropping 50 points per trade, I'll take 4 trades right off the bat and start on -200 seven days a week thanks.
You want to amass around 25,000 points across a season, so that's dropping about 0.2% of your total points for 3% more trades each time you make that transaction.

If you are spending points on trades, the points cost obviously has to be high enough to be make it punishing without making it worthless.

If first place had spent 200 points on extra trades, he'd have needed ~150 points from those players to still win (all other things being equal). In the middle of the pack, dropping 50 points costs you heaps of rankings though, you'd need to get your moneys worth for it to be good. Replacing someone for a 1 week injury probably wouldn't be worth it. But spending extra trades early to fix up initial mistakes would almost certainly pay off.
Those that started without Cleary this year would gladly spend 100 points to get him into their team in the early rounds.
In the late rounds replacing a season ender will always be worth it too - someone doesn't have to score much to give value if the player he is being traded for is scoring 0 every week. But you'll still be behind people who don't need to spend the points.

For people that rank highly in EPL fantasy, how many times a year do they spend points on trades?

Benji Marshall could easily have the best highlights reel of any player.

When he was on in his prime he did things that no other player could, amazing step, acceleration and had the most deceptive passing game to beat the opposition.

Its a pity that with injuries and age he couldn't continue to perform at that level.

The Canberra Times reporting that Jamal Fogarty has agreed to a three-year deal with Canberra.

easytiger wrote:

If it's anything like dropping 50 points per trade, I'll take 4 trades right off the bat and start on -200 seven days a week thanks.
You want to amass around 25,000 points across a season, so that's dropping about 0.2% of your total points for 3% more trades each time you make that transaction.

Personally, I think managing trades is one of main fundamentals of the game - possibly the central strategy once you're clued up on good players etc - so I really don't like the idea of messing with trade numbers, buying trades, leveraging points for trades, or increasing max trades per round.

At present it seems to be at a good balance of being challenging, but enough trades to be workable and engaging.

I forgot to mention it in the survey (and I think they'd never do it), but I always liked the idea of one wildcard trade that you can use in addition to your round trades at any point in the season. Only one though, so it's not a major effect, but adds a little extra strategy.  

Having thought about it a bit more, it needs to be a way heavier points penalty for fantasy NRL just because of the way price changes work.

I was initially thinking FPL is 4, you get 2 for just showing up, so probably 40-60 in NRL.

But with the way price changes work that would be very worth it to pay for trades and make up team value early.

It’s an interesting idea but no doubt it changes the dynamics a bit

I think the part that intrigues me is it’s a change that keeps casuals in - as they see it as an out/cheat to maintain interest, try and catch up in leagues with mates etc - but it’s actually making the game harder. Value of player A v player B - x is more difficult than simply A vs B

robelgordo wrote:

Having thought about it a bit more, it needs to be a way heavier points penalty for fantasy NRL just because of the way price changes work.

I was initially thinking FPL is 4, you get 2 for just showing up, so probably 40-60 in NRL.

But with the way price changes work that would be very worth it to pay for trades and make up team value early.

It’s an interesting idea but no doubt it changes the dynamics a bit

I think the part that intrigues me is it’s a change that keeps casuals in - as they see it as an out/cheat to maintain interest, try and catch up in leagues with mates etc - but it’s actually making the game harder. Value of player A v player B - x is more difficult than simply A vs B

Good point: buying trades would totally change the head to head game.