I made a new thing! Designed to keep track of a weekend’s tournament play – one of the picture on the left, and six and the picture on the right, with a blank page on the back. Feel free to edit for own use, as long as you don’t become a millionaire on the back of it…
Tournament Record – Editable word version
Well that was a crazy day’s Blood Bowl…
Took Khorne, because at 1200 TV you can have all the toys – Bloodthirster with block, 2 heralds, 4 bloodletters, 4 pit fighters all with block.
Game 1 was v Lycos’s wood elves, so I wrote off the day, but my armour and injury dice were on fire, and he kept failing dodges. He stalled in his turn 6 and I managed the turnover – should have been able to go in at 1-0 up except for choosing poorly not to GFI to put myself out of range. Too excited about all the other dice not working! Interesting T16 one-turn score situation, in that I rolled a blitz, but because he had sidestep and I had frenzy I could have made the situation worse. Turned out OK though, 1-0 win, happy days!
Pleased to face Tankface’s Ogres in game 2, always nice when a stunty team sneaks a win in game 1 and then you are lucky enough to be drawn against them. Or so I thought. I struggled to get my head around the treemen being used as Ogres, and despite being very familiar playing with and against the team, never really got my head into the game, including blocking in turn one having not taken account of guard properly. My bloodthirster skulled out, naturally. A few turns in the first half with no bonehead meant that I was forced to use my blitzes against the ogres instead of removing snotlings, and when he was able to escape from a tricky situation in the second half it was all a bit too late, and I lost 1-0, finishing the game with an attempt to block my own player. Pro move.
More stunties, but high-powered ones in the form of Duffins’ Goblins. I made life harder for myself on defence by only setting up 9 players, as two of mine managed to camouflage themselves on the sideline, and counting is hard. Surprisingly, I failed to stop him scoring, especially after he removed my LOS from the pitch, leaving me with 6 players. Lucky draw in the end, 1-1.
Brain failing for game 4 against Touchdown’s Dwarves, and as he had been out the night before this was not vintage Blood Bowl by any standards. The highlight however was me over-enthusiastically lobbing one of my players into the KO box but overshooting so that he ended up down the back of a radiator. Loki to the rescue with his long pole!
The day ended as ridiculously as it had been all day, with him skull reroll skull and then me pulling off a 3+, 2+, 4+, 3+ touchdown for a 2-1 win and mid-table obscurity.
Dementor took home Star of the Car, having a good day with his Dark Elves including beating 20phoenix’s High Elves, and it was good to be in a room with a substantial number of Welshmen as Wales completed the Six Nations Grand Slam.
Thanks to Loki for yet another excellent Bubba Bowl, which this year was warm enough that I didn’t have to take the next day off work. So it was a win! Grats to DaPiranha for the win too, obvs…
I’ve been asked a couple of times recently about importing into Score, so here’s how.
Download this file into Excel/OpenOffice, and fill in the first three rows. Copy and paste the formulas in the fourth column as far as necessary. Copy column D into notepad, then save it as something.
Open Score, then go to File…Import Teams. Done.
It’s been a busy one – just seeing how many different aspects of the hobby I can fit into one weekend!
Game on Fumbbl using teams in practice for the Bubba tournament in March – my Khorne against Twelfman’s Orcs. Managed to get the Bloodthirster to catch the ball but didn’t manage to go on to score!I think that’s everything – what other forms of BB could I have added?
For those who are not aware, Fumbbl has the ability to create custom rulesets, which is a great way of doing tournament practice, as well as running whole NAF tournaments on Fumbbl. I wanted to use it for one-off games, so I created a ruleset (called sann0638, because it seems it’s not possible to change the name after it’s been created), with 1,750,000 in gold and the ability to add 9 normal and 9 double skills to your team. As you don’t need to use all the money or skills, this basically gives you enough to create any tournament team you might need.
To join the fun, go to this page: https://fumbbl.com/p/group&group=11851&op=view
Click “create a team for this ruleset” and then decide which ruleset you want, for example I’ve created this team for the Bubba tournament in March.
Then find an opponent, probably one who has created a team for the same tournament!
There is a full list of the rulesets (almost 1000) that people have created on my fumbbl forum post. The one that is being used for the current NAF tournament is ruleset 7, and is currently world cup rules, though may change in the future, as Strider84 keeps it up to date for the most recent NAF tournament (I think). Ruleset 960 is also world cup rules, but that will only work if games are scheduled, as the skill set will depend on the day.
Finally, I would recommend anyone who wants NAF tournament practice in general to get involved with the tournament series on Fumbbl – it’s a great way to play!
Update March 2020: You can also use this for playing league games, but obviously only for lower TV teams because of the skill limitation. You will also not be able to give stat boosts or injuries. So on reflection, test mode is probably better suited: https://fumbbl.com/help:Test+mode
For completeness!
Started day 2 expecting to play Enderman, as we were the only two on 3 losses, but due to the vagaries of the Swiss system (starting at the top and working down) we dodged each other, and I played BrutalDeluxe and his Skaven, taking me back to Speedball 2 days from the late 80s. He was a fairly new player, and hadn’t played against goblins before, so when I received the secret weapons went to town, and demolished most of his team! In the second half his thrower fumbled, as Skaven throwers often do, and I got my first win (and first non-loss) of the weekend!
Oh yeah, and I scored with a Troll!
My reward was 20phoenix’s Norse, a top Welsh player having a bad weekend. When I received, I hoped for a repeat of the last game, but didn’t manage to remove any Norsemen. I managed to squeeze my blodge pogoer through for a TD in turn 5, and stop him scoring, so was then hopeful for the draw. Fink da Fixer let me down, with snake eyes on two bribes, so the second half was hard work, and 20p walked in for the T16 TD and a 2-1 win.
In game 6 I played against Legolas, a friend of my sons who often travels with us, and an honorary member of the Sann Clan. He doesn’t get much practice in between tournaments, but Lizards are a hard matchup for Goblins, and it was a really tight 2-1 win.
So 2-0-4 for the tournament actually saw me come second in the stunty cup, after Hobnail’s Goblins took it. Because all injuries counted for casualties, the 23 I put by various means in the dead box won me most casualties, hurrah!
I won’t be taking Stunties to a 2-day tournament again, and it will be a long time until I take them to a 1-dayer. I want to be in the mix for the top positions, and playing against the best players – it’s the kind of Blood Bowl I like, and while I do appreciate that Stunty teams are their own kind of challenge, it’s not a challenge I’m prepared to pay a chunk of money for. Will leave that to others!
Thanks Hawca and team for organising, and for moving it into February for the first time in 5 years so I was able to make it.
After 82 NAF tournaments it’s always good to find a novel reason for choosing a race for a tournament, so for this one I made a bet with myself – if Wales beat France in the 6 Nations on Friday night, I would take Goblins, if not, then Chaos Dwarves. I also hadn’t tried out Gobbos with the Doom Diver, and I do like the Welsh habit of advertising previous stunty cup winners, so thought I would take on the challenge of being added to that illustrious roster.
16-0 to France at half time and it looked like I might have a successful weekend instead, but then a catalogue of French errors meant that the little guys made the trip across the (free!) bridge instead. I went for 2 fanatics, chainsaw, and a piling on Troll, hoping to reduce numbers and then walk in some TDs. Fink da Fixer also joined the party.
Game 1 was against my younger son, Dementor, with Pro Elven Union (as I’m calling them nowadays). He received, and went for a fairly quick TD, but Diving Tackle did for him. Sadly, it only postponed the TD by a couple of turns. Failed to score back, but managed to kill both Blitzers with my chainsaw, before the bribe failed (even with Fink’s reroll!) and he got sent off.
The second half was exciting, as I cleared the pitch by turn 5 – 6 KOs and 5 Casualties. So should I go in for the draw or push for the win? The win, of course! He got 3 elves back, so had to put them all on the LOS (below!), but a touchback ruined my fun, and I ended up losing. Waaah! Should be plenty of opportunities for revenge though…
Game 2 was AngryHobbit’s Orcs with Ripper. My chainsaw died on a thrown rock on the kick off, then I managed to wipe my fanatics out with each other on a double both down (there was a good reason!), so it was an uphill struggle. AH was kind enough to offer me a few chances, so it finished 1-0.
Goblins were hard work, and became harder in Game 3 – High Elves with an Accurate/Strong Arm thrower! I killed 3 of them in turn 1, but then it went pear-shaped in turn 2 as his Tackle Blitzer killed my dodge that was supposed to be the corner of the cage, and then knocked down my blodge pogoer, popping the ball loose. Sad times! It got worse from there, finishing 6-2, after I got a couple of Doom Diver TDs but he got a lot more, obviously.
So what to play for on Day 2? I have 12 casualties, as everything dead is counting, so will be looking to rack that up. 3 wins would put me in contention for the stunty cup, though with experienced stunty coaches in Glowworm, Cornish and Hobnail, that’s not guaranteed either.
Onwards!
Another Eurobowl in the bag – Scotland cap number 5, 10 years after cap number 1! A great weekend, with only the Blood Bowl performances being disappointing. The Wales team did a brilliant job at the SWALEC stadium, home of Glamorgan cricket club, which was a fantastic venue with a free-flowing bar, superb AV equipment and a lovely atmosphere throughout with plenty of space to socialise. I’d taken the kids along in the first ever all-U16 Europen team, and they had a superbly enjoyable weekend as well.
Game 1 was against a league mate, Raging82, the Ireland team captain, my necro against his lizards. With a tackle wight and sharpened claws, I was fairly happy with the racial match up, but sadly I only managed a single casualty all day, and it wasn’t in this game! The game was captured on the YouTube channel for Beer and Blood Bowl, so I might watch back once the dust has settled. It started well with a failed skink pickup, and if my blodge ghoul had made the 4+ pickup in my turn it would have been a very different game. Instead, it bounced to a skink…
I had other chances – a two dice block to free a wight to blitz the ball carrier failed, as did a GFI to surf late in the half, but I went in 1-0 down. Facing a full team of 11 I would have been happy with a draw, but Nuffle messed with me when my flesh golem caught the ball. Made the rookie error of thinking 8 turns would be enough to wander up the pitch, and at this point the lizards started leaving the pitch, but in turn 7 the golem got bogged down within range of the endzone and it all went wrong. Kudos to Dan for starting his captaincy with a win for himself and the team, as we went down 4.5 to 3.5. In the new scoring system, 0 points. This will be a recurring theme.
Game 2 was against Austria, Lewdgrip’s Chaos Pact. Managed a fair amount of pressure on his drive, but his Dark Elf squirmed free and squeaked over the line in turn 6, giving me 3 turns to score back. Sadly, it was a deep kick, and I messed up my strategy, pushing too hard for the equaliser at the half. This did not go well, and a failed ghoul dodge meant I went in 2-0 down. On my drive I scored in 2, and then popped the ball loose, but he recovered it again. And then nonsense, as I managed a long pass after some serious shenanigans to pull it back to 2-2. Sadly, another 4.5 – 3.5 loss, and still 0 points.
Game 3 v Hungary, this time against Nelkor’s unconventional Wood Elves – 2 wardancers and 10 linemen! I managed my first casualty of the day in this game, but as he also ran out of space in the KO box I shouldn’t moan too much. A 2-0 win, and a first round win for Scotland.
I had a quiet evening with the kids, though I understand the Cardiff night life played host to a good number of Blood Bowlers, making the most of the clocks going back and the fairly late Sunday finish.
Game 4 was Norway, Straume’s Dark Elves, who I had faced at the NAF Championship. I left an early half chance involving a 4+ dodge into the cage, which worked, but I should have been able to recover, only to be mashed by a 1 in 81 failure. Shouldn’t have made the mistake, and deserved to lose 1-0 against a great player. Sadly, another 4.5 – 3.5 loss.
Game 5 v newcomers Greece, to whom I had leant an Orc team, but luckily I wasn’t facing them as that would have been confusing. A more conventional Wood Elf team than previously in the hands of Cana, and ended up on stream again. Game started well, killing the strip wardancer in the first couple of turns, and I thought I’d done enough to stop the score, only for the elfs to do the elfy thing in turn 8. Plenty of carnage on my drive, but again mostly KOs, so when the captain’s orders came through to push for the win I was sceptical, and pleased when they were reversed a minute later. I walked it in on my turn 8, and was happy to rely on my golems to stop the one-turner. Made another mistake though, as I had forgotten about his frenzy wardancer, and I’d set a player up two squares back from the line instead of 3. He took full advantage, pushed him into his own half, and then used him to get the two squares that his catcher needed. 3 unprotected GFIs later and I’d lost. Not a trick I’d seen before, but was kicking myself about it. Worth a watch! We won the round, but hosting rights were beyond us at this stage, being fought over between Finland and Malta.
Final game and I was on bottom table for I think the first time in my Eurobowl history, facing Quetzal of Belgium’s undead. Managed a 1-0 win, to put the seal on his rubbish results weekend, which culminated in him rolling two lots of triple both downs. Scotland won the round, putting us on 3-0-3 for the weekend, and midtable again.
Results wise, congratulations to England after one of their tightest Eurobowl wins, and a huge well done to the Scottish Europen team who managed third. The Sann Clan got a round win against Beer and Blood Bowl, plus a handful of decent individual results, including contributing 10 casualties to Wobert’s most casualties trophy!
I’d decided before this tournament to hang up my Eurobowl boots as there is enough strength in depth resident in Scotland and taking part in Scottish tournaments to be able to pick two Eurobowl teams, so it’s healthier for Scottish Blood Bowl to have plenty of opportunities to qualify without taking up a wild card pick. If ever the team end up with only 7 willing to travel, then I’ll expect a call, but that doesn’t seem like a likely situation any time soon, so I’ll be supporting from the sidelines in future, and probably heading up a Sann Clan team in the Europen, depending on the cost of heading to Poland in 2020 and Malta in 2021!
I was really pleased for the organisers, Hawca and Dapiranha, plus others, pulling off a triumphant weekend. Very glad personally that the scoring software I wrote survived the weekend, and that I was able to contribute in a small way to the success of the tournament. Next up is to get registered for the World Cup, in which I’ll be playing and probably not having to do anything to do with the organisation, which was an enjoyable experience in Portugal and I looking forward to experiencing it again!
Good day at Exebowl V today. A day of milestones – my 80th NAF tournament, my 26th NAF race, my 400th NAF game, and my first NAF loss to one of my children!
Exebowl is close to my heart because I’m a South-Wester at heart, having been born in Plymouth and gone to school in Somerset, so I’ll always make an effort to attend. The fifth edition was a bit smaller than usual, after a move to Kirton Games in Crediton (half an hour from Exeter itself) and a change in organiser, but 18 people gathered in the Kirton Games loft. It’s a nice little games shop, with tables perfectly sized for BB and a choice of traditional seats or bar seating (i.e. tables at different heights).
I took Khorne, Alex had Wood Elves and Linus Bretonnian. Skill package was 1200 TV, 4 singles and a double, max 2 of a skill, no tiering. Zoe came along to experience the BB tournament ambience, with a view to getting her playing in 2019. She knows the rules, but has trouble making decisions in a timely manner (sounds familiar, tbh…)
My first game was against HairyPete, @amanandhistoys on Twitter, the originator of Exebowl and a thoroughly nice bloke. I scored in 5 turns, giving him 4 back. He was pretty comfortable until he thought that my Bloodthirster had M5 intead of M6, and left the ball carrier exposed as a result. The surf put my chap on the sideline (a juicy “return surf” target) but also one of my players on the ball and heading for the score. Pete had to choose between surfing and stopping the score (see top picture), and went for the surf for entertainment value, so I went in 2-0 up. In his half he managed to remove a few players, and scored in 6 turns, giving me 3 to chill out and protect the lead. This wasn’t to be, alas, as he rolled a blitz, which combined with the scatter to make life difficult. I managed to hold on though for a 2-1 win. Alex and Linus were both in commanding positions, but managed to throw them away for draws. Kids, eh?
Game 2 was v Dru Drew, so good they named him twice. Using orcs, which I think are a great match up for Khorne, as the can opener can do its worst. Fairly comfortable 1-0 at the half, but then my drive went pear-shaped because of a 1 in 81 block failure. Very squeaky 2-0 after a punt down the pitch. Alex’s wood elves did the elf thing and won 4-0, and Linus got beaten up as Pete took his revenge on the clan.
Three coaches on 2 wins going into game 3, but as I was the lowest I played against the highest on a win and a draw, which happened to be Alex (that 4-0 win!). It was also going to be third game on the stream, which can be found at twitch.tv/kirtongames. I started to beat him up a bit, though this was limited by three consecutive failed wild animal blitzes in the first half and two at the start of the second half. I went in 1-0, though it was far from straightforward. On his drive he scored in 3, but again shenanigans were required, leaving me 6 turns to get the win. Unfortunately, I was still facing 10 elves, despite a plethora of armour breaks. In short, I failed to analyse the wardancer threat effectively, and he made me pay, stripping the ball, recovering it, then stalling out effectively for the win.
A good day for the clan overall – Alex in 2nd with most TDs, me in 3rd, Linus on 0/2/1, and Zoe introduced to the glorious world of tournament Blood Bowl!
My attempts at finding a clear way to stream continue! I now have a green screen style dice roller, which allows me to superimpose the dice on the board, which is pretty cool…
This is me rolling yet another 1 when my minotaur attempts to blitz, and slumping over the table, as part of my SAWBBL league game. But the latest problem is that by getting enough light on the dice box to make it show up on the board, the rest of the table is plunged into darkness. Boo!
There was a separate issue that neither player could see the dice very well, which for me detracted from the enjoyment of the game. And I like using a dice cup! Which comes to the nub of the issue, which is that when playing the game the enjoyment of the two players has to be paramount, and I haven’t yet managed to figure out how to stream really well without reducing this. Apart from having a third party to do the filming, as the Waterbowl chaps have shown very well in their partnership with Element Games.
All of this of course is not to diminish the fab streaming from Raging82, the Beer and Blood Bowl guys, and others, but I’m on a quest to make tabletop BB as viewer friendly as electronic BB can be, and I’m not there yet…
