Blood Bowl - for real

[Trippy]

Where is the rulebook for Legendary Edition? "View Player Manual" does nothing and I haven't found an option in-game yet.

[Falconeer]

>>> Rulebook (.pdf) here <<<.

And this is the beginner League. We are ALL beginners. The amount of noobness in the first League was insane, and I don't know if any of the newcomers would be daring enough to call himself an expert.

[Trippy]

>>> Rulebook (.pdf) here <<<.

Thanks.

[Modern Angel]

After not playing for the better part of a year it's sad how bad I've gotten

[Falconeer]

Very useful tips for newbies.

Shift + G brings up the grid.
Shift + N shows players positions.

Talking about Nuffle, I just played a game with my Dark Elves (The Helsinki Emotionals) vs. an equally new Amazon team. Both 1000 TV.

Well, after 3 turns I was down to 8 players. At the end of first half I only had 4 players on the field. He killed/injured SEVEN of my Dark Elves in 8 turns, two of them dead for good. At the beginning of second half I have 5 on the pitch against his 11. And I am still winning, one TD ahead thanks to a lucky turnover and a long bomb. I am curious to see how badly he will beat me in the second half.

Seriously, natural disasters can be lots of fun, but this game is frustrating and ridiculous at the same time. 

[Falconeer]

He managed to KO another, I played since turn 10 with 4 players. I lost 2 to 1. Fun.

[Falconeer]

Awesome resource site: The Blood Bowl Playbook.

[Modern Angel]

I became extremely, extremely bad at this game for real. You guys are going to trounce me.

[Teleku]

Gah, I don't know what team to use for the league.  I'm enjoying several, but I still find I get the most enjoyment out of playing Wood Elves....

Can we do two leagues?   

[Ruvaldt]

Likewise.  My Nurgle team is really growing on me, but the dwarves are definitely calling as well.  Really enjoying the Legendary Edition, and can't stop playing.  It feels pretty much complete, but for the Chaos Dwarves issue and I feel pretty confident that they'll patch that in like they did with the Dark Elves previously.

[Kodan]

They have pretty much already said absolutely NO to the Chaos Dwarves. Not only has Gamesworkshop said not only no but HELL no there are also issues with the fact that a Bull Centaur covers 4 squares. There are technical issues with that in regards to certain rules. Forget Chaos Dwarfs they will NEVER be in the PC versions.

[proudft]

I've never seen a Bull Centaur mini before, but in the current Competition rules, p. 77, in the FAQ:

Q: My big guy (Ogre, Minotaur, Troll, etc.) player's base is larger than the square on the board (pitch).  Does he take up more than one square for the rules?
A: No, all players in the game from a Snotling to a Treeman only occupy one square on the board (pitch).

So, sounds like they're one square dudes with no weird rules implications.

[ezrast]

They have pretty much already said absolutely NO to the Chaos Dwarves. Not only has Gamesworkshop said not only no but HELL no there are also issues with the fact that a Bull Centaur covers 4 squares. There are technical issues with that in regards to certain rules. Forget Chaos Dwarfs they will NEVER be in the PC versions.

Source? Official word seems to be that GW is cool with Chaos Dwarves, though I can't verify because I don't speak French (edit: click through the link, there's a translation in the video description). Also the implementation issues are due to modeling the new body types - I don't think CD have any unique rules, as per proudft.

[Ruvaldt]

Chaos Dwarves were largely covered on page 22 of this thread.  I'm pretty sure that Falconeer was able to quote a source which more or less said that Chaos Dwarves were originally slated to be included, but GW didn't get back to the developer and let them know that they were a part of the license in enough time for Chaos Dwarves to be in the original release.  I've never read anything that implies they will be disallowed.

[Kodan]

Yeah looks like I had some info wrong but I could swear I saw a DEV say that Gamesworkshop said no but according to the FAQ on their website I was correct about the bull centaur issues....


Why are Chaos Dwarfs not included in the Blood Bowl Legendary Edition?
In order to release Blood Bowl Legendary Edition by the end of 2010, we had to make a tough choice with the time and resources available. After much discussion, we all agreed (Cyanide, Focus, Games Workshop) not to include them in this Blood Bowl version, but who knows for the future. Chaos Dwarfs are more tricky than the other teams to implement, essentially, due to the presence of the Bull Centaurs and Hobgoblins. As the Centaurs are four-footed, it makes their design and integration more complicated, and the Hobgoblins would be another brand new body type too. Our estimations showed that Chaos Dwarfs would take much more time compared to other races and would compromise the development schedule beyond our needs. Nevertheless, Chaos Dwarfs are not banned from Blood Bowl the video game. They just won’t be in the Legendary Edition. – Incidentally, we hadn’t decided if they would have tall hats or not ;)

[eldaec]

The animation for Bull Centaurs takes more work.

They still don't cover 4 squares or have any rules complications at all.

[Kail]

So, I'm trying to learn this game, figure I'll play a campaign on "Easy" to get the hang of the Dark Elves.  They're supposed to be fairly versatile, right?  Should be interesting to play.

First game, I'm up against Dwarves.  First turn, one of their Slayers frenzies one of my linemen off the field.  On my turn, I get another player KOed from a double skull roll.  I have three Assassins on field (two on my roster plus a star player), all of whom are making a stab attack per turn, none of them have any effect.  I lose a third player during the Dwarves second turn.  Fuck this, quit game.

Figure I'll try again, try another DE team, against Wood Elves this time, this should be a less fatal game, right?  Wood elves start on offense, manage to somehow critically injure one of my linemen right off the bat.  They advance about a third of the way up the field before it's my turn.  My three assassins take their three stabs, flub all three.  I take a risk and try to get a player in smacking range of the carrier, but he fails a dodge roll and my turn ends.  The rest of my team is still fairly well positioned to stop any runners from getting through, but they still manage to make it part of the way down the field because I couldn't get anyone on their runner last turn.  He's fairly exposed at the start of my next turn, but I don't have anyone free.  My assassins take their stabs, miss all three again.  Most of my players are tied up in blocking situations where the odds are in their favor, so I figure I'll push a few enemies back and run the people that frees up to the runner and try to blitz him.  First try, I have two dice, and roll a red skull and a "both down".  Since either one would end my turn, I blow my re-roll and get double red skulls.  Fuck.  Turnover.  Wood Elves score on turn 3.

On offense now, I figure I'll try to hold on to the ball and get enough enemy injuries that I can hopefully score twice before the final whistle.  My assassins take their stabs, one actually finally knocks an enemy down but they don't do any lasting damage.  I get a few tackles but nothing really lasting.  Advance the ball a bit, and it's the Wood Elves turn.  They make no less than seven dodge rolls to put three players on my runner.  I've got enough guys around him that I've got two dice to block them, but as soon as I try, I roll double "both down" and suffer a turnover (assassins missed all but one of their stabs that turn, too).  Wood Elves turn, they tackle my runner, killing him stone dead.  They then grab the ball and start running it down the field.  Fortunately, I've got a bunch of guys right there and my assassins are in range, so I charge in with two dice, and roll double red skulls again.

In summary: Fuck this game.

[Ruvaldt]

Sometimes the dice just aren't with you, and it can be pretty aggravating.

Having said that, I would never advise starting with Dark Elves.  They are a pretty versatile team, but they generally start underpowered.  Ultimately they can be built into the bashiest of elf teams, but early on their only real advantage is their agility, and they sorely lack strength.  I would suggest playing a different team.  If you're looking for versatility in a team that is well-suited to beginning players the Orcs are right up your alley, and the Humans aren't far behind.  Orcs are a little better at the running game, and Humans are a little better at the passing game, but they can both put up a fight, cause some serious injuries, and score a reasonable amount of points while they're at it.  Dwarves are good too because they're practically made out of concrete, and all have the block skill.

[eldaec]

I'd start with undead, necro, orcs, or dwarfs. If you are keen on elfs, pro or high elfs are a better place to start than dark.

In fact, if you are learning I'd start with story mode, which takes you through a variety of (mostly half length) games with objectives like 'pass the fucking ball' rather than trying everything at once. It also gives you experience with all the teams.

(also, assassins are not great, don't take three assassins in your initial lineup)

[Strazos]

Any suggestions on what to do about the big basher teams, like the undead with mummies?

I started a campaign with Skaven...and I'm getting better, but I mostly get rolled when they smack the shit out of my team. Same with an Elf team.

[Modern Angel]

Don't be scared to dodge out of tackle zones. That's the entire point to playing a high agility, high move team. Your odds are better with a 3+ dodge roll (what agility 4 gets you) or even a 4+ dodge roll than they are with two block dice on you.

[Teleku]

Yeah, stay mobile.  You can dodge out of tackle zones easily.  The main thing to remember is, they only get to do one block (a charge) on any player who isn't touching one of there's when end your turn.  Unless I need to keep guys pinned down for some reason, I always try to dodge out all my elven players away from contact with his players (when practical) at the end of a turn.  This means they will always have very limited chances to hurt your team.  If you end your turn with half your team in contact with the opponents players, your going to get the shit beat out of you next round (unless the dice rolls go your way obviously).

[Ruvaldt]

A good tactic as Skaven when combating cages, especially with the heavy-hitting teams, is to maintain a 1 square distance and force them to use blitzes and movement through tackle zones to move the ball.  You'll never win a stand-up fight with them, but you can make them jump through enough hoops that they'll fall down now and then, and after that you grab the ball and run like hell while they're out of position.  One should develop a Gutter Runner (or two) as safeties who can penetrate the opponent's side of the field quickly, and put ball retrievers in a tackle zone within the first round or two.  Make them move, constantly, and don't give them any opportunities to fight you unless it's a blitz.

The Skaven aren't quite as dodge-reliant as elves, but yeah, your high agi is a major strength.  Still, I like to stock up on rerolls, and get a player with Pro, if you can, because dodging can be...dodgey.  Due to the fact that Skaven players are so cheap this isn't hard to do, usually.  Also, I wouldn't bother with a rat-ogre.

[Falconeer]

In summary: Fuck this game.

From the most recent manual, Designer's notes:

Some teams are more challenging than the others to play, either because of their skills requiring advanced strategies to be effective, or because they have difficulty winning. These teams have been designed this way on purpose to give challenges to coaches who master the basics of Blood Bowl. These more challenging teams are: Chaos, DARK ELF, Goblin, Halfling, Khemri, Nurgle, Ogre and Vampire. Coaches should be aware that these are considered teams for more advanced players and can be confusing or difficult to use if you are new to the game.

In red, how you forced bad luck on yourself  


Kail, sign up for the f13 League. That's how Blood Bowl is supposed to be played. Whatever disgrace is gonna fall on you, it's probably gonna happen twice as hard on your human opponent. Come on, buddy.


EDIT: On what Ruvaldt wrote, remember that an undefeated Skaven player (Aez) won the last f13 League, with 6 wins and a tie.

[Kail]

Kail, sign up for the f13 League. That's how Blood Bowl is supposed to be played. Whatever disgrace is gonna fall on you, it's probably gonna happen twice as hard on your human opponent. Come on, buddy.

I would, but I don't have Legendary Edition (I'm playing with Disenfranchised Minority Elf Edition in the hopes of getting my skill somewhere above "I NOCKED A MANS DOWN ONNA FLOOR HUR HUR" so that I can hopefully afford the game in time for season 3).  I am interested in seeing how real people play this game, though, you guys oughtta put some replays up on the Radicalthon subforum when this gets going.

[Megrim]

So, I'm trying to learn this game, figure I'll play a campaign on "Easy" to get the hang of the Dark Elves.  They're supposed to be fairly versatile, right?  Should be interesting to play.

First game, I'm up against Dwarves.  First turn, one of their Slayers frenzies one of my linemen off the field.  On my turn, I get another player KOed from a double skull roll.  I have three Assassins on field (two on my roster plus a star player), all of whom are making a stab attack per turn, none of them have any effect.  I lose a third player during the Dwarves second turn.  Fuck this, quit game.

Figure I'll try again, try another DE team, against Wood Elves this time, this should be a less fatal game, right?  Wood elves start on offense, manage to somehow critically injure one of my linemen right off the bat.  They advance about a third of the way up the field before it's my turn.  My three assassins take their three stabs, flub all three.  I take a risk and try to get a player in smacking range of the carrier, but he fails a dodge roll and my turn ends.  The rest of my team is still fairly well positioned to stop any runners from getting through, but they still manage to make it part of the way down the field because I couldn't get anyone on their runner last turn.  He's fairly exposed at the start of my next turn, but I don't have anyone free.  My assassins take their stabs, miss all three again.  Most of my players are tied up in blocking situations where the odds are in their favor, so I figure I'll push a few enemies back and run the people that frees up to the runner and try to blitz him.  First try, I have two dice, and roll a red skull and a "both down".  Since either one would end my turn, I blow my re-roll and get double red skulls.  Fuck.  Turnover.  Wood Elves score on turn 3.

On offense now, I figure I'll try to hold on to the ball and get enough enemy injuries that I can hopefully score twice before the final whistle.  My assassins take their stabs, one actually finally knocks an enemy down but they don't do any lasting damage.  I get a few tackles but nothing really lasting.  Advance the ball a bit, and it's the Wood Elves turn.  They make no less than seven dodge rolls to put three players on my runner.  I've got enough guys around him that I've got two dice to block them, but as soon as I try, I roll double "both down" and suffer a turnover (assassins missed all but one of their stabs that turn, too).  Wood Elves turn, they tackle my runner, killing him stone dead.  They then grab the ball and start running it down the field.  Fortunately, I've got a bunch of guys right there and my assassins are in range, so I charge in with two dice, and roll double red skulls again.

In summary: Fuck this game.

To put things in perspective for you: it took me two seasons of 11 games each, of playing a DE team in a reasonably skilled league before I started winning games. During that time, I had my team mauled several times, and practically destroyed once (I was playing games against teams with 900+ team value difference after losing so many players). Dark Elf is a very, very good team (some have argued that they are the best team in the game - all things considered) but as Falconeer said; it takes time to learn them because they don't have any immediately obvious skill paths for players and they don't have an obvious playing style.

Simple things like "oh i keep rolling Both Down/Attacker Down, woe is me!" Block with your Blitzers as much as you can in the beginning. They have Block to start with, so you automatically save on re-rolls if you get bad dice. Most of your other complaints are basically stuff which will go away in half-a-dozen games after you start to get the hang of how tackle zones, assists, and dodging works. If you're interested, I will upload some reps once i get home from work (you have vanilla BB, right?).

[Modern Angel]

The other thing is that there is very deliberately an element of wild, random, hair pulling, gouge your eyes out chance. If it feels unbalanced sometimes it's supposed to.

[Falconeer]

Nice video about table top Blood Bowl.

I propose to make a pod on the "Games Workshop/White Dwarf/Warhammer" phenomena, I will travel to the 2008 Blood Bowl tournament (a dungeons and dragons/american football hybrid) to witness the epic battles and struggles to victory. Whilst there are some people who consider themselves too cool for the body-odour drenched, male-patterned-baldness world of geekdom that is Games-Workshop. My pod will illuminate the passions and the common threads of humanity that this tribe has. As the players manipulate their own tribes of painted lead figures we will follow the journey of 5 contestants as they seek glory or humiliation at the hands of their peers.

With a soundtrack of epic Wagnerian proportions, we will witness what happens when two tribes go to war.......

http://current.com/entertainment/comedy/89118110_a-bloody-game-of-dice.htm

 

[Ruvaldt]

The best part of that video is the waxing poetic over dice.  "It's an interface between man and fate."

[Kail]

Continuing to try to figure out this game:

How do you defend against a passing game as a dodgy team?  As a fighting team, I can just put someone on their reciever, right?  Then they don't seem to be able to catch as well (as far as I can tell).  But as a dodging team (been trying Goblins lately) if I try to put a guy on the reciever, the reciever just knocks him on his ass and is then unchecked.  So far my main strategy with dodgy teams has been to stay out of whacking range until they make a mistake, but that doesn't seem to work if they try to pass.  I can sometimes get someone in between the thrower and the reciever and attempt an interception, but that's fairly rare, and since they're both unguarded, they have a fair amount of freedom about who they're going to pass the ball over.

[Modern Angel]

You're asking the wrong question. The correct question is "How can I win a game against anyone as a goblin?" The correct answer is "Pray".

[Ruvaldt]

Yeah, I don't think Goblins are a fair representation of a dodgy team.  They're not a fair representation of any kind of team, really.  Goblins, Halflings, and Ogres are the comic relief of Blood Bowl.  It sounds like you're doing it right, for the most part.  You're just doing it with a team of incompetents.  An advantage of dodgy teams is that they're able to push through one or two runners to blitz the opposition's thrower, and possibly take out any possibility of a pass that way.  Skaven Gutter Runners are notoriously good at that sort of thing, and can weave through an opponent's O-line or cage to tackle the ball carrier before any pass is even attempted.  Elf and Amazon Blitzers (and to a degree Orc Blitzers) can be built up to do this sort of thing as well.  Otherwise, use your team's movement advantage to get between passer and receiver, and also position someone between the potential receiver and the end zone to make them jump through more tackle zones in order to score.  Overall, though, teams that are really good at passing are generally just going to score more often, and that's that.  You can do a lot to minimize the damage, but you're still going to have to deal with the likely result that they're going to score at some point, and often more than just once.

Edit: Oh, and teams that pass a lot are generally lightly armored so foul the shit out of them.   

[Kail]

Sorry for further retarding this thread, but I'm having trouble finding info for this game.

Finally got Legendary Edition, and it seems pretty sweet... only change that bugs me is that every time there's something in slow motion the announcers voices do that sloooooooow moooootioooooonnnnnn effect which was kind of novel the first time but really gets old fast (especially if you play the realtime mode).  I like the game chatter, personally, but the slowing down effect bugs me.  I don't suppose there's any way to disable it without shutting voices off altogether?

Also, what do block dice look like?  It looks to me like the computer's rolling a D6, but I can only see 5 outcomes (A down, B down, A+B down, stumble, push) which suggests to me that one outcome is twice as likely as the others, but I'm not sure which?

I'm trying to get through a campaign (because the story mode pisses me off), but as far as I can tell, the only cup that's open at first pits my TV 1k team against a bunch of TV 1.5-1.8k teams.  Is that right?  There's no "newbie cup" or anything?

Tried playing as Humans, ugh.  How the hell are you supposed to play them?  Got matched up against Wood Elves, and my team didn't seem much bashier than them while being slower, less agile, worse at throwing... and even though our Linemen were pretty evenly matched, their Wardancers were whipping shit all over my Blitzers, so I don't think I could really beat them in a blocking game, and when you're getting out-muscled by the damn Wood Elves, there are problems.

[proudft]

Also, what do block dice look like?  It looks to me like the computer's rolling a D6, but I can only see 5 outcomes (A down, B down, A+B down, stumble, push) which suggests to me that one outcome is twice as likely as the others, but I'm not sure which?

The blue arrow (push) is on two faces of the d6.

I'm trying to get through a campaign (because the story mode pisses me off), but as far as I can tell, the only cup that's open at first pits my TV 1k team against a bunch of TV 1.5-1.8k teams.  Is that right?  There's no "newbie cup" or anything?

Yep, the AI needs the extra skills resulting from this against a real person.  It's kinda cheap, but oh well.

Tried playing as Humans, ugh.  How the hell are you supposed to play them?  Got matched up against Wood Elves, and my team didn't seem much bashier than them while being slower, less agile, worse at throwing... and even though our Linemen were pretty evenly matched, their Wardancers were whipping shit all over my Blitzers, so I don't think I could really beat them in a blocking game, and when you're getting out-muscled by the damn Wood Elves, there are problems.

Humans are, supposedly, adaptable and flexible and you counter your opponent accordingly.  So yeah, bashing elves was probably the correct tactic.  (Also, wardancers are indeed mean.  They're sort of in disguise on that elf team.) Against dwarves you'd run and pass and stay away, etc.  Of course, being flexible means you aren't really good at any thing in particular, so it's a fairly hard team to play.  I've only played a half dozen or so game with them myself, I don't like them that much personally.

[Llyse]

For humans vs woodelves I would suggest grinding out a 2-1 win.

So if you get to pick choose to kick try let them score and use your blitzers to get 2 die blocks to maul his team.

After he quickly scores slowly run the ball up and equalise while endeavouring to bash even more of their team.

You'll receive the ball in the 2nd half and repeat the same.

Make sure you protect the ball carrier from the ever annoying war dancer.

Maximise your blitzers placement since they have block and higher movement.