S#5 - Playoffs (1/8 finals)

[Falconeer]

And the Feminists are out in a breathtaking 3 - 2 overtime match.
Despite a GLORIOUS match by Sylvia and the girls, a stellar passing game and a decent defensive positioning, Lizards simply proved too strong causing lots of CAS (5 by the end of the game) and a significant amount of KOs.

Carnifex scored first, but then I tied in two turns before the end of the 1st half. Second half started with my possession and despite a very well placed fireball which KOed two of my players once again a pass under pressure resulted in a TD for the Amazons. With about 5 turns to play though, as they did in the first half the Lizards managed to grind their way downfield and score in the 15th turn making sure a couple more girls were not going to return on the field. Overtime started with the ball in my hands, but with a disadvantage of 9 to 11 players, and a couple of not so good rolls created the premises for the ball to get loose again and with not too many issues guarantee Carnifex the winning TD in turn 20.

A great Seasons for The Bell Jar Utd. Tonight it could have been a win, but Carnifex is solid and eventually deserved to win. Good luck to him, and see you all in Season #6.

[lamaros]

Yikes, the Lizards are powering up across the league. I've got to stop Ulysses making a sweep of it.

Also Llyse to miss his first grand final. Hard luck to the Necromantics, well done Catfighters.

[carnifex27]

The Bell Jar  Utd. 2-3 Carnifex's Cripplers.
It was a pretty tense game that took twenty turns.  It came down to the wire, but eventually the Amazons had too many skilled players out of the game to score on the final reception, and the Lizards won off the only turn over of the game.  As usual against Amazon team, they were hard to knock down, but once they went down they stayed that way.  The Amazons suffered 3 badly hurts, a miss next game and a -1ag, though I don't recall which players took the serious injuries.  I'm pretty sure this was the first game I've played against a live opponent that got a 20/20 for the match rating, so thanks to Falc for a great game and making BloodBowl a part of F13.

[Bann]

Not sure what to do about my match. Ice and I had talked upthread about trying to get the game in before we left for our respective holiday trips. I'm going to be visiting family and will not have access to a bloodbowlable computer. According to steam, Ice has not been online in the last 3 days. I will return the afternoon (CST) of December 31st, and should be available to play anytime that afternoon/evening or pretty much all day New Years Day. I'll be checking into this thread/board while on break to hopefully arrange a match right over the deadline if we can get a small extension.

Ice, talk to me. Let me know whats shakin'.

[Ingmar]

Go Battletech. 

[lamaros]

Rat Ogre dead. Star GR MNG (after using apoth). Other Block GR MNG. Two linemen injured. One KOed. Failed leaps, failed GFI, failed dodges, failed passes. Defender down on every GR every time.

Half time. 1-0 down.

But I wont quit! Death or Glory!

[lamaros]

Nuffle says: Death!


The game was decided by some reckless play early by me as I charged up the line going for a second turn score. When my Rat Ogre got killed I was left squashed near the side, and I decided to go for a blitz to get my guy through, instead of taking the chance with a leap. That backfired when the dauntless roll failed, and my rerolled 2D against dice both came up with Attacker Down.

From then things got worse, with the Lizards hitting my GRs hard. I kept getting the ball carrier hit when charging up to try and score quickly, with Defender Downs spilling them on to the pitch. One of these blitzes ended up with my star GR getting -AV, which I rerolled to a MNG. Things snowballed from there, with a number of other players going down, and more attempts to score foiled by failed dice (dodges and passes) and clever play from Ulysses. In the end I couldn't stop him from scoring before the half, and he setup to stop me getting a 1TDD.

The second started a bit better (even though I had only 7 players), with a good long kick giving me a sniff. Uylsses made things hard though, and despite knocking down his carrier a couple of times I could never get the ball safe. With both my block GRs injured I had the wrestle guys handling the ball, and they just didn't have the power to stand up to the attacks.

I thought I was in with a chance for a long time, as my dauntless GRs were getting the claws in to the carrier and I was a chance if one of them could stand up to a blitz, but it never happened.

One long crowd throw in knocked the ball over near his Krox, but I got there first and picked it up. It then got knocked out of my hands and fell into the hands of his Krox. He caged it up, but I blitzed with my strip ball GR and got the dauntless roll, then a defender down/stumbles result. This put the wind up him. We were both on 0 rerolls but it didn't stop him as he picked the ball up and ran it in with a GFI, nailing the coffin closed and lowering it into the earth. I had three turns to score twice, which was made mockery of when my GR failed the pickup after the kick.

I think (but I'm not sure) that this is the first game my team has played that we haven't scored, which is a real shame.

Congratulations to Ulysses, early injuries were hard to deal with, but he played a very safe and strong game.

(Edit: Sorry for all the typos)

[Ulysees]

The Minizilla's 2 - Rape of Skabine 0

I won the toss and elected to kick, as the teams were fairly equal in TV there were no inducements so it was going to be a straight out fight between the 2 teams with no outside assistance provided and this match certainly put the Blood in Bloodbowl, at least as far as Lamaros is concerned.

Lamaros received the ball and as I was worried about being surfed I left the wings open and Lamaros took advantage of this to run a strong screen down the left side of my pitch but was unable to hurt any of my players on his opening turn. I move players in the way of the drive and move my Krox down to mark his rat ogre. On the next turn Lamaros chooses to blitz one of the marking Saurus' but with 2 die against comes up with a skull and I accept the gift, knock a few assisting players away giving my krox a 2 die block against his rat ogre which comes up POW and promptly kills the rabid mammal! My next block hit the gutter runner and again knocks him down and the resulting crowd toss throws the ball into the middle of the pitch. There is a lot of scuffling over the next few turns but once again Lamaros manouvers himself into a position where he can score on his next turn unless I can succesfully blitz the carrier and once again the dice come through, not only rolling the POW but also MNG injuring his star gutter runner! I pick up the ball and scurry up the pitch to score the opening touchdown on my turn 7 giving Lamaros 1 turn to reply but he doesn't tempt fate and instead moves everything that he can out of range of my team leaving me 2 rats to hit, one gets pushed the other one gets injured leaving Lam with 10 against 11 in the second half.

Second half kicks off with a really deep kick by Lamaros so I pick up the ball and suffer my one and only defender down on the first turn but with the ball being so deep there is no opponent able to get near me and on my next turn I position a cage to move into but I have used a GFI to make one of the corners and needing 2 GFi's to put my skink safe I fail the first one spilling the ball. Lamaros accepts the gift pushing away a marker and scooping it up with a GR but is not able to move far away and I blitz him down on the next turn and this time form the cage properly but don't take into account his strip ball GR who get s a push spilling the ball again. However at this point I have knocked a couple more rats out of the game and numbers are starting to tell, I clear the markers but the ball somehow ends up in the hands of a saurus who can't get far before once again having the ball taken from him and now Lamaros tries to switch the play with most of my saurus' on the right side of the field, however I get a blitz freeing the ball and this time my krox rolls a 6 to catch the ball! This should be pretty much game over now with 3 turns to play, I amble up the pitch, move some support in place and prepare to wind down the clock but don't count on Lamaros and his suicidal GR who once more rolls 2d against but this time get s POW and stumble to knock the ball free and once more he scoops the ball up and heads downfield. I heavily mark him, score the pow and scoop up the ball and make a handoff to score on my turn 14 . 2 - 0 to the lizards.

Lamaros either failed a dodge or rolled a skull on his first move of the next turn, pretty much summing up his luck in the match and with a few more blocks thrown the game ends 2 - 0 and the Minizilla's are through to the quarter finals for the first time.

I think the match was harsh on Lamaros, seems like Elves are pretty much immune to me but Norse and Rats take a damn pasting, with no less than 6 injuries and a KO during this match (with 1 dead Rat ogre thrown in for good measure) not scoring on his drive then being under manned to defend in the second half against 7 str4+ players was always going to be hard but Lamaros got the ball free pretty much every time he blitzed my ball carrier, the bad thing for him is that I was pretty much able to do the same to him as well and since what I was hitting tended to end up off the field it gave me a big advantage as the match progressed. Was a good match, could this be the year of the Lizard?

match is uploaded on BBmanager.

[AndyDavo]

Not if anything to say about it, I have.

[Ulysees]

Well since you are playing elves you are safe from me - the other lizard teams on the other hand? We'll have to wait and see 

[Ingmar]

Innnnnteresting.

[Ruvaldt]

This is really playing havoc with my brackets.

[AndyDavo]

what brackets?

When will you play your game?

[Ruvaldt]

what brackets?

When will you play your game?

My prediction brackets.

And I'm not sure; soon, I hope, but it's a busy time of year.

[Ingmar]

Assuming you're free on the 29th Ruvaldt that is the first day we're back in town.

[Ruvaldt]

The 29th or 30th work just fine for me.

[AndyDavo]

u2 are not playing in the playoffs, i meant your game vs the norse.

[Ruvaldt]

I know I'm not playing against Ingmar, but Ingmar and Sjofn will be back in town on the 29th, as Ingmar just said.  That's when I'll play against her.

[Sjofn]

Ingmar owns a laptop, I do not, thus he gets to be my messanger boy unless I steal my mother's laptop for a little while.

[carnifex27]

So ummm, my +1 agi/block skink just rolled a +1 str 

[AndyDavo]

gratz, you have a high elf catcher on your team with blodge! (and stunty)

[Ingmar]

It's a wardancer with a niggling injury! (and no leap...)

[Teleku]

Yeah, give him leap and he'll be a fragile wardancer that can't pick up the ball!

[Falconeer]

Ok, I am stranded out of town, away from serious computers and serious internet connections. I should be back in Roma tomorrow, or the day after tomorrow. That's why I haven't checked or valoidated anything, and I am sorry for that. I have no idea how many matches still need to be played, but please play them as soon as possible. While the holiday season is a mess, and so maybe the December 29th deadline wasn't realistic, it's still nice to have an idea on when the remaining matches will take place. Extending a deadline is one thing, ignoring it is another (I am writing this about 5 hours before the expiration of such a deadline).

[Sjofn]

2-0 victory to Ruvault after I conceded in order to have a team left for next season. It was turn 6 or 7 and I had ... 4? Guys left on the field, and they were all dudes I wanted to live, dammit! Live!  

[Ruvaldt]

The Ex-Presidents of Doom 2 - 0 The Mutiny

I won the toss and chose to receive in the pouring rain, and set up my big hitters for maximum claw/mb usage!  I got lucky and Lump Beefbroth was struck by a rock from an enraged Chaos fan, stunning him, and I ran my first round pounding down a few vikings and rolling double 1s on the ball pickup.  Sjofn's first round started with a double red skull and a turnover very early, and I got to work blocking even more and finally picking up the ball.  I worked down the field a bit, KO'd one werewolf and injured another, and was struck by Sjofn's lightning bolt while only sustaining a simple knocked down with no injury to my ball carrier.  I had a little trouble picking up the ball again; think I failed four rolls, but eventually picked the ball back up and had a really productive round of blocking in which Sjofn sustained two injuries and two kos, leaving her looking at a second half with a pretty big player disadvantage and possible serious injury.  I scored with Franklin Pierce, giving Sjofn one turn, and we went into the second half.

Sjofn conceded at this point, which I could certainly understand because without any werewolves on the field I was starting to target her more developed AV7 players.  I missed out on some mighty blow team development, but I scored a second TD with Franklin Pierce, bringing him to sixth level.  Sjofn played as good a game as she could given the situation and, frankly, had she some poor luck with dodges that caused several turnovers.

Carnifex, you're next!

[Ice Cream Emperor]

Ice, talk to me. Let me know whats shakin'.

So not long after my last post to this thread my Internet died, leaving me without a phone (my only phone being an ip-Phone via said internet) and suddenly embroiled in holiday-related scheduling stress, none of which left any time to a) get the Internet fixed or b) remember I was supposed to be playing Blood Bowl prior to leaving town for the aforementioned family trip.

Anyways I'm back now and it looks like the Baby Jesus fixed my Internet while I was gone. I have more commitments on the day of the 31st, so it sounds like New Year's Eve or New Year's Day are the earliest me and Bann can play -- both of which are, I believe, past the deadline?

[Bann]

Im going to be back home tomorrow (12-31) at around 2:00 pm CST. We never do anything for NYE, so I can play anytime tomorrow after 2, or anytime on the 1st. Do you want me to just find you on steam, or would you like to try and setup a specific time?

[Ice Cream Emperor]

A specific time might be nice but I'm not really sure when I will be available. However, I also have no particular NYE plans, so probably by 6-7 PST or so I will definitely around. Might be earlier, but will make an effort specifically to be on by then.

[Llyse]

Looking forward to this game, Bann's going to have to bring his A game but has a chance of beating Ice's elves to a pulp.

A ridiculously belated congrats to all the playoff winners!

Especially Comstar who played a gear match to get win while underwomanned.

My picks of Lamaros and Teleku losing makes this playoff exciting with newcomers and Lizard's galore!

It was only last season that Ruvaldt lost in the first round so should be some replays worth watching! 

[Ruvaldt]

It was only last season that Ruvaldt lost in the first round so should be some replays worth watching!  

That game still haunts me.  My f13 ranking will definitely be going up after this season.

Also, cheers to Drogg who advanced to round two for, I think, the first time.  The lizards are definitely having a banner year.

[Megrim]

Looking forward to this game, Bann's going to have to bring his A game but has a chance of beating Ice's elves to a pulp.

A ridiculously belated congrats to all the playoff winners!

Especially Comstar who played a gear match to get win while underwomanned.

My picks of Lamaros and Teleku losing makes this playoff exciting with newcomers and Lizard's galore!

It was only last season that Ruvaldt lost in the first round so should be some replays worth watching!  

To be fair, you choked your game harder than me peeking double-doors on Aztec. But yea, seeing more Lizardmen for once is nice.

[lamaros]

Changing of the guard or just a few poor games? Stay tuned next season to find out!

It's a shame I lost. I would have been a good chance to get through this time, as I normally do well against Lizards and the other fast teams are all out. And I checked, it was the first game that my Skaven were held scoreless in.

[Megrim]

The problem you're going to face more and more in the future with that team, is exactly as you experienced in the playoff game. If you have hyper-developed Gutter Runners and little of anything else, once those start to go off the pitch your team's capabilities crater. This is what makes it hard to play Skaven well past the initial "give ball to GR, 2+ to victory" stage, which everyone loves so much.

[lamaros]

The problem you're going to face more and more in the future with that team, is exactly as you experienced in the playoff game. If you have hyper-developed Gutter Runners and little of anything else, once those start to go off the pitch your team's capabilities crater. This is what makes it hard to play Skaven well past the initial "give ball to GR, 2+ to victory" stage, which everyone loves so much.

That GR makes my team look like it plays differently than it does. I'm actually an awful offensive player, which was my problem in that playoff game - I should have been more careful trying to score and protected my players. I actually rely far more on the dauntless wrestle GRs than that guy. "give ball to GR, 2+ to score" isn't really what I do, "dauntless to knock ball free, +2 to score" is more accurate.

My star guy has 6 ball receives in his 20 scores. And 5 MVPs. 12 of the 16 MVPs I've gained have gone to GRs. The other 8 or 9...

My team is unbalanced because everyone else has died. I've never tried to level the star player or the other GRs overly much, I've just not been able to level anyone else. I've lost about 6 throwers and 4 blitzers, and just lost the Rat Ogre now too, with of course the rest of the linerats going down too. I dunno if it's luck with the GRs, or no luck with the rest, but that's just how it's been.

Teleku has a better spread, but he has 7 players with more than 20 games. I have 4. The last one to make it to 20 games, my Rat Ogre, just died.

Also I've just rolled normal skills, apart from the one double on the dodging blitzer and the +MV.

I'm going to swap to the goblins anyhow, but if I was playing Skaven I'd probably ditch the team and start over.