Quarter-final game vs Dwarfs

Playoff time and my Undead were facing a really strong Dwarf team coached by my mate George.  Their TV was a rather chunky 1950gc so I had opted to leave my team as being 390gc lower so that I could induce Count Luthor as it would be the first time I had ever used my painted mini of him.

George and his killer dwarf team

I received the ball and got up the field but with the dwarfs kicking ass everywhere, I was running out of players and I had to score in my Turn 7.  I was really lucky as George had injured a zombie, a wight and Luthor but they'd all regenerated!  No such luck for one of my unskilled ghouls though as he was out of the game permanently.  George received the ball in his Turn 7 and pulled off an audacious two-turn score to equalise, assisted by my chump move of not marking the ball carrier when I should have before rolling some dice (which failed obviously)

In the second half the Dwarfs received and their AG5 blitzer managed to lob a ball down field to a waiting lineman who was the only player in my half - who caught it and slowly scampered off.  I tried to backtrack but George scored in his Turn 7.  I had two turns to try to pull it back to 2-2 and I got lucky as the ball ended up being a touchback at the kickoff.  I gave it to Count Luthor and sent him down field surrounded by ghouls and wights.  George has some poor luck here as a GFI with his super AG5 blitzer to mark a player ended in failure and he took himself out of the game.  Luthor managed to blitz, dodge and GFI to make it all square!

Count Luthor - pulls it out of the bag...

As it was a playoff, we had to then play another half using overtime rules.  The dwarfs rolled to receive the kick and we started doing our best to outmaneuver each other but nothing came of it after all.  It was time for penalties - which for our league is a best of five.

My first two rolls were sixes - but George's dice came good and he won the penalty shootout 3-2.  So his dwarfs go through to a semi-final round and my season comes to an shuddering end.  I thought I would be more disappointed about losing but it was such an epic game, I really can't complain.  My undead had a decent season but they were never a really strong team.  They went unbeaten the whole season which is something I guess - but only being able to get five wins and the rest draws just isn't enough to really mean they deserved a semi-final spot.

So that's the end of this mini-blog then.  It's been a long and difficult season to manage and I'm actually quite pleased it's all over.  There were so many coaches that dropped out it really did slow the league down - and having scheduled games with coaches who couldn't attend each week didn't help either.  The format of the league will have to be reconsidered for next season.  With the new GW Blood Bowl box set being due out before Christmas, it might not be too long before the league restarts - probably in the new year.  So I'll sign off now and I'll start a new mini-blog then once I've decided which team I want to use.

Until then, keep on fouling!

Undead vs Lizardmen

My final game of the CBBBL league was played last night vs my friend Phill's Lizardman team.  We were quite close in TV value as my best ghoul player was a MNG - I just induced a 4th reroll and left the team using three ghouls.

Phill and his feisty Lizardmen

I received in the first half and managed to get in a right mess straight away.  Phill managed to blitz the ball carrier and knocked the ball free and a skink ran in, picked up the ball and scampered out of reach.  I was having a terrible time trying to injure anyone, my Dirty Player zombie again failing to hurt anyone with his attempted fouls.  Phill scored in turn 6 of the first half and I couldn't equalise before half time.

For the 2nd half I did start knocking out some of his players and the lack of numbers meant I was able to put a little more pressure on him.  I got the ball off him and tried to break away but his skinks kept escaping and one-die blitzing the ball carrier and taking him down.  Eventually I got clear of them - he had one final chance to blitz with a saurus which scared me as he managed to get into my cage by dodging in on a roll of a 6!  Thankfully he could only push my ball carrier.  I hit him away in the final turn and scored to make it 1-1.

By drawing with Phill, my Undead finish 3rd in the Premier division of the CBBBL and that also meant that Phill's Lizardmen couldn't quite make the top four.  The final positions for the top four in each of the two divisions are :

Premier :

1st - Gork n' Mork United (Orc)

2nd - Gorerotted (Nurgle)

3rd - Lords of Midnight (Undead)

4th - Da New Ork Giants (Orc)

Championship :

1st - The Marvellous Avengers (Human)

2nd - Bloody Owls (Dwarf)

3rd - Grottingham Forest Goblins (Goblin)

4th - Gnoblin Steppes (Goblin)

The playoffs will start very soon once everyone had made their teams ready.  The games have already been set by the final league positions.

Game A : Gork n' Mork United vs Gnoblin Steppes

Game B : The Marvellous Avengers vs Da New Ork Giants

Game C : Bloody Owls vs Lords of Midnight

Game D : Gorerotted vs Grottingham Forest Goblins

I'm playing in Game C vs the rather meaty Dwarf team, the Bloody Owls.

Overall, I think the Undead team have done just about enough - they haven't been fantastic.  They are the only team in the league not to lose a game the whole season: they go unbeaten in twelve games: whether it will be enough to see them do well in the playoffs is something else though.  I haven't had a single stat increase for any of them which is often a key factor when playing in the playoffs.  I guess I will just have to take each game as it comes and do the best I can!

Undead vs Skaven

In the CBBBL Premier Division, my Undead team were sitting in 4th place and still had two games to play, the first of these was against my friend Darren and his Skaven team, the Skittersneak Skidmarks.  We were at very close TV so there were no inducements.  My main worry was that he had a Blodging Gutter Runner who was also MV10 and with Sprint.  I needed a draw at the minimum to ensure I would make the playoffs although a win would have been nice to give me a chance of winning the league.

It was a really good close game and the Skaven turned me over in the first half quite easily.  I brought it back to 1-1 before halftime but was expecting his one-turn TD machine to take the lead.  Thankfully I managed to roll a Perfect Defence kickoff result which ended with me surrounding the Gutter Runner to block him.

In the 2nd half, Darren's Skaven did what Skaven do and scored again pretty quickly which gave me a chance to push up the field.  I was hurting a few of his players and did my best to foul his one-turner but to no avail.  I eventually opted to go for the draw by stalling out until the end.  We finished on a 2-2 score which meant the Skaven couldn't qualify for the playoffs and I was assured a place.

A really close fun game.  It's been ages since I last played a game against Darren and I've missed it - he's a great opponent.

My Undead have one more game left in the league vs Lizardmen which is going to take place next week.  If I can win it well I stand a chance of going 2nd in the league.  This would mean a much easier game in the playoffs so well worth trying for.

A Box of Sorrows

It's been a couple of months since my last tabletop game with my Undead team but they finally got back onto the pitch with a game vs my friend Erik and his Pro Elf team, The Lament Configuration.  I totally forgot to take a picture before the game started but, as Erik was borrowing my team, I'll put up a picture of my Pro Elf team instead.

The Lament Configuration - Away Strip

Erik last played against some Orcs so he was missing a few players on MNG's so he had needed to bring in some Journeymen to make up the numbers.  We rolled to see who would start the game and Erik won; he elected to receive so at least he could try to get a touchdown while he still had eleven players on the field.

It started well enough for him, as my team proved unable to cause any casualties (which then continued throughout the whole game) but were only good out stunning or knocking out players.  Erik got himself in a bit of a sticky situation with a Blitzer and a Catcher on the sideline which I surrounded.  Erik managed to throw the ball out of the mass of my players which led to him scoring - but not before I had pushed both of them into the crowd which caused a -1 MA on the Blitzer and a niggle on the Catcher.

1-0 up and Erik was defending with eight players vs my eleven.  I retrieved the ball and managed to do some hand offs to allow me to push up the field whilst bashing any elves in sight.  I continued to beat up his players and get them off the pitch into the knocked out box and scored on my turn eight to make it 1-1.

Erik had even less players on the field as he kicked off for the 2nd half and my Undead continued their proven tactic of knocking people out.  Erik also helped by dodging his players out of the way and watching them knock themselves out as they failed.  It was around this point that my Dirty Player zombie decided to get in on the action as the Undead started gang-fouling the few remaining players.  His boot went right through the head of one poor Elf catcher and killed him dead - which then gave me a free zombie.  By the time the end of the game was approaching, there was only one elf player left on the field and he was face down as my ghoul strolled over the line to make the score 2-1.

Erik started his final turn with just four players on the field - and his players were so woozy they were unable even to make a simple completion.

After the game, only one of my players had gained a skill.  It was the ghoul who had scored two touchdowns and also gotten the MVP award.  He now has Block.  This will be handy as my next game is against the Orc team Erik played previously!

A Win's A Win

After a bye round in Round 4, I was due to be playing against a Chaos Dwarf team in Round 5.  Unfortunately the chap coaching that team has dropped out of the league :(

It means that I win a game as he forfeits and I get 2 x MVP and 2 x Winnings - but it's a lot less fun.

One of the MVP rolls went to one of my Wights so I've given him the Mighty Blow skill to help do some damage.  Fingers crossed I will get another game in with these guys before the end of the year!

Come on, you elves! You wanna live forever?

These games just keep getting harder!  Round 3 and my Undead team were facing my buddy Shane and his Wood Elf team "Project XIII".  Shane is a Blood Bowl veteran known as Rodders in the BB community; he's a NAF Regional Tournament Organiser, ran the excellent Carrot Crunch BB tournaments and is probably the best coach I play against regularly - so I knew I had my work cut out with this one.

"This is my game face.  Be very afraid."

He'd lost his first game vs Chaos Dwarves and won his second game vs Lizardmen and his players had a few more skills than mine already.  He had a MV9 Wardancer and Catcher, another Wardancer with Strip Ball and a Catcher with Block.  My only hope was to just keep swinging and pray that I could outnumber him enough to outscore him.

The Lords of Midnight - Undead

2 x Mummies (one with Guard)

2 x Wights

3 x Ghouls

5 x Zombies

3 x Rerolls

Project XIII - Wood Elf

2 x Wardancers (one with MV9, one with Strip Ball)
2 x Catchers (one with MV9, one with Block)
1 x Thrower
4 x Linemen
2 x Journeymen
1 x Reroll

We both rolled the same amount of fans so neither of us got FAME. Shane won the toss and elected to kick first which would give me a chance to start swinging straight away.  Unfortunately Shane then managed to roll a Blitz which gave him a perfect opportunity to swarm into my backfield and crowd the ball.  He even managed to catch the ball that was kicked!  All I could do was get back and try a desperate one dice blitz on the Wardancer with the ball - which knocked him down and a Ghoul managed to collect the ball.  In the next turn, Rodders dodged out some players and hit the Ghoul with his Strip Ball Wardancer which sent the ball flying.  Whilst he was trying to clear a way for him to get to pick up the ball, he pushed a zombie onto the ball which made it scatter - which duly landed in the lap of the Ghoul who had taken it off the Wardancer!  Rodders later splatted the Ghoul and got the ball away to score.

All this time, my Mummys were doing there best to smash up his team - something that carried on throughout the game!  Despite their best efforts they couldn't do anything other than cause a MNG on a Journeyman - they just kept Badly Hurting players.  Shane was down to nine players when he kicked off again but this time he rolled a High Kick and one of my Ghouls caught the ball as it landed.   Lots more smashing occurred and I was lucky to knock out both Wardancers in the same turn.  The Ghoul scored at the end of turn 8 to make it 1-1.  Rodders set up to receive with just four players in his final turn of the half - which ended up with a Catcher failing a dodge and knocking himself out.

In the second half, I was kicking to Shane and he still only had four players!  Despite this, he managed to run a catcher deep into my half after giving him the ball.  I surround the Catcher with my own players and blitzed him - and after a reroll I was still only able to push him.  It was all too easy for the Catcher to score in the next turn after my dice fail.  2-1 to Rodders!  He set up again, still with just four players left although one was the Strip Ball Wardancer.  I started moving the ball upfield after the kick and Shane did some razzle dazzle to blitz the ball carrier with two dice against - but both were POWs!  Down went the Ghoul and the ball scattered into two tackle zones.  Still not enough to worry a Catcher though as he waltzed though tackle zones like they weren't there and then picked up the ball!  My dice started working here as one of my Ghouls knocked out the cursed Wardancer, then a Wight blitzed the Catcher to take him down and release the ball.  It was then I started fouling the Catcher as much as I could as he was just so annoying!  A Ghoul retrieved the ball and headed upfield - and despite Rodders best efforts I scored in the final turn to make it 2-2.  Rodders was left with just one player on the field but had escaped any injuries apart from a MNG on a Journeyman.

Despite causing five casualties, only one of my players had done well enough to warrant gaining a skill - one of my Zombies who had caused a casualty and gotten MVP.  I have given him the Dirty Player skill so he can be more effective at fouling.

My Undead are on a bye for Round four so the next time I use them they will be taking on Chaos Dwarves.  Until then, it will be the Goblins playing who will be facing Ogres!

An Evening With Nuffle

I had two games lined up for yesterday evening which was a little ambitious of me.  The first was my initial Championship game for my Fouling Griffons goblin team vs a human team and the second was a Round 2 game for my undead against a Nurgle team.

"ST7 ball & chain you say?"

My goblins were facing my mate Dave's human team, The Marvellous Avengers.  His team is really nice - they've been painted so that the models look like Marvel Avengers members.  Unfortunately I had to field my WIP goblins who've only had a basecoat on the skin.  I will endeavour to get some more done on them before their next game!

Our rosters were as below :

Fouling Griffons - Goblin

2 x Trolls
1 x Pogoer
1 x Fanatic
1 x Looney
1 x Bombardier
8 x Goblins
4 x Rerolls

The Marvellous Avengers - Human

1 x Ogre
4 x Blitzers
1 x Thrower
1 x Catcher
4 x Linemen
2 x Rerolls

We drew on the FAME roll but I won the toss so I elected to receive the kick-off.  Dave obligingly lined three linemen up on the LOS and, upon my setup, I placed the Fanatic in front of them.  I left the Looney and Bombardier off the pitch to save them for the 2nd half.  The Bombardier did some pushy shovey stuff as he did but, as this was my first tabletop game using goblins, I made a mistake on how the ball and & chain works as I was throwing block dice to see what happened to already prone players (something I will remember in future!).  At one point he managed to throw a triple skulls so he wasted one of my rerolls fairly early on.  Dave's team took a bit of a smacking to start with but he managed to work out a blitz on my Pogoer who went KO and also managed to cause a MNG on a troll by fouling him.  It was all downhill from there!  Dave turned me over and managed to score on turn 6 which meant I had to bring on my remaining secret weapons - disaster!  On the last two turns I sent my Looney after Dave's Catcher and Thrower but just managed to stun them.  The Bombardier only threw one bomb in a desperate effort to stop Dave scoring again - and it was laser guided causing his ogre to fall over and to knock out a blitzer.  For the second half, I just had one troll and six goblins on the field so there wasn't a lot I could do to stop Dave scoring again.  In the end, the game did finish 2-0 which was probably a fair result.  I will miss the troll for the next game for sure!

After that tough game I was rewarded by yet another tough game!  I put the goblins away and got out my undead to play Sherwin's Nurgle team, Gorerotted.

"Are you sure you don't just want to concede now?"

Sherwin is a very good Blood Bowl coach despite ignoring the game and playing Warmachine solidly all last year.  He's won the league a couple of times so I was expecting a tough match.  Not as tough as it ended up being though...

Our rosters were as below :

The Lords of Midnight - Undead

2 x Mummies (one with Guard)

2 x Wights

3 x Ghouls

4 x Zombies

3 x Rerolls

Gorerotted - Nurgle

1 x Beast of Nurgle
4 x Nurgle Warrior
1 x Pestigor (Block)
5 x Rotters
2 x Rerolls

I received the ball to start with and the ball bounced into the hands of a ghoul which was rather handy.  I had to work to make a hole through his rather whiffy defence (Sherwin had to spend the whole game reminding me to roll for disturbing presence by saying "UGLY! each time I forgot") and managed to get a ghoul through to go 1-0 up.  It was at this point that Sherwin's dice went on fire!  POW!  Badly hurt ghoul.  POW!  Serious injury on a wight (thankfully regen'd), etc.  His team smashed me apart.  I managed to stop him equalising in the first half but I couldn't do a lot to stop him in the 2nd half apart from keeping him to a 1-1 draw.  Miraculously, none of my players were seriously hurt so I still have a full team for the next game.  I was going to buy a ghoul but after two games I only have 60k winnings so I think I will buy another zombie so I have a spare man for fouling purposes.

Two really hard games - I think the rest of the season is going to be exactly the same for both my teams!

Let's Get Ready To RUMBLE!!!

It's go time!  As I said in my last post, my first game of the season for my Undead team was a game against my mate Andrew and his Orc team.  Andrew is as much of a Blood Bowl addict as I am; of all the people in the Chelmsford Bunker, it's he who goes to most of the local tournaments with me.  He won the league last season so it was a good way to get things started.  Our team lineups were :

Lords of Midnight - Undead

2 x Mummies

2 x Wights

3 x Ghouls

4 x Zombies

3 x Rerolls

Da New Ork Giants - Orcs

4 x Blitzers
4 x Black Orc Blockers

1 x Thrower

1 x Troll

1 x Lineman

2 x Rerolls

"Nuffle's blessing upon this game!"

Andrew won the FAME roll but I won the toss so I elected to receive the ball.  I kept my three Ghouls in the backfield to collect the ball and started trying to punch a hole through the solid wall of Orcs but it was pretty ineffective.  Most of the half was spent trying to make a clear way through them but Andrew was canny and kept some players back.  As the turns ticked over, I had to force a break through his lines which results on my ball carrier getting knocked over.  Andrew surrounded the ball and I was left trying to silly tactics in the last turns to try to recover but those, rather expectedly, failed.  We ended the half 0-0 and with me having a knocked out Zombie.

For the 2nd half, I lined up three Zombies to take the punches at the LOS and kept the other players back a couple of squares ready to adapt to what Andrew threw at me - which was a shitload of orc fists!  One of his Black Orcs caused a Badly Hurt casualty on one of the Zombies which was regenerated to put me down to nine players whilst his Thrower recovered the ball and hid in a cage.  I threw some blocks and tried my best to defend as well as I could which was tricky being men down.  I did manage to push his Troll away from the cage though which meant he would be less inclined to move him in case he went Really Stupid.  It was around this time that Andrew ran out of rerolls - just at the point when one of his Black Orcs tried a two-die block against one of my Mummys.  The skull and both down result saw my Mummy on the floor and his Black Orc receiving a Niggling Injury. Andrew responded in the next turn by causing another casualty, this time one of my Wights who was badly hurt but who also Regenerated.  As the turns got closer to the end of the game, Andrew was under pressure to push forward but a one-die blitz on one of my Ghouls saw another skull result and I had my chance to block some players out of the way and hit the Thrower with a one-dice blitz which knocked him down and sent the ball flying.  Unfortunately for me the scatter saw the ball land in the middle of his players so there was no chance I would be able to get a player away to score so I just aimed to cause him problems with scoring himself.  The game ended a rather hard fought 0-0 draw!

Both of us had our fan factor go up and I earned 40K winnings whilst Andrew only got 20K even after adding the 10K for getting the FAME.  I got very lucky with my MVP roll though as it went to the Mummy who had caused the casualty on the Black Orc!  He rolled a normal skill so I have given him Guard for the next game.

For my next game for the Undead will be taking on the Nurgle team being coached by Sherwin the club President, but my next game will be the first outing for my Goblin team against some Humans in the Championship division.  I suspect that will be an entirely different type of game!

"The orc pain train is coming!  Choo-choo!"

CBBBL VIII starts this week!

The waiting is over - the division draws have been made and the matches start this week!

The Lords of Midnight have been drawn first against my buddy Andrew's Orc team - Da New Ork Giants.  I'll be playing that game tomorrow evening so I'll post up some pictures and do a match report.  I have made a change to my roster for the start of the season - I will be using :

2 x Mummies

2 x Wights

3 x Ghouls

4x Zombies

3 x Rerolls

My Goblin team is still sitting on my paint station so I have a bit of work to do on those before they are ready for their first game.  They have been drawn against a Human team called The Marvellous Avengers.  I'm aiming to play that next week.

It's all kicking off!

Warm up games - Undead vs Wood Elf + Goblins vs Ogres

On 5th August I had two warm up games against my friend Barry - one using decent teams and another using rather less decent teams...

The first games was Undead vs Wood Elves and it was a real beast of a game.  The Wardancers were unstoppable in the first half and Barry soon took the lead.  My Undead then started doing some damage and the lack of elf players started taking its toll.  I equalised in the 2nd half and Barry had to defend hard to stop me from going on to score again.  The game was a real battle and ended a fair 1-1 result.

Game two saw us using our stunty teams, Goblins vs Ogres.  This game was an absolute polar opposite of the previous game with both sides doing their best to out-chump the other.  It was crazy, hilarious and we were both laughing our heads off at the uselessness of our players.  The game again finished 1-1 but it was great fun.  It was the first time I've used Goblins in a tabletop game and I'm looking forward to using them in the Championship division.  They won't win many games but they will amuse.

Warm-up game : Undead vs Dark Elves

I had a quick warm-up game last Wednesday against my buddy Tom's Dark Elves vs my Undead team.  I'm still playing around with the roster I'm going to be using for the league but I am currently using :

2 x Mummies
2 x Wights
2 x Ghouls
5 x Zombies
3 x Rerolls
30K in the Treasury

Tom's Dark Elves was set up with this roster :

4 x Blitzers
7 x Linemen
2 x Rerolls
10K in the Treasury

Tom did have some terrible dice rolls during the game and I managed to take out quite a few of his players so the game ended a rather encouraging 3-1 to the Undead.

Two teams enter. One man leaves.

This is going to be a micro-blog for two of my Blood Bowl teams in a new season of Blood Bowl at my wargaming club.  I have created a blog like this a couple of times before and it was good fun - even if no-one else reads it, it can act as a chart of the highs and lows as the team works their way through the season.  In a change from how the league was set out last year, we are now running two divisions; the Premier Division (for seasoned Blood Bowl coaches) and the Championship Division (for rookie coaches and pros using stunty teams).  I'm going to be using Undead in the Premier Division and Goblins in the Championship; Their team names are the Lords of Midnight and, of course, the Fouling Griffons (which is a play on words of my NAF name of Howlinggriffon). I chose to use Undead simply because I haven't used them in a league before and I only painted them recently for the NAF Championship.  I chose Goblins as I really do need to try a different stunty team from my beloved Halflings.  It will also give me motivation to paint my new Willy Miniatures team I bought at the end of last year.

The league I play in is called CBBBL (The Chelmsford Bunker Blood Bowl League). I am the league commissioner and I also run the website that hosts the software for the league (the OBBLM software which is just great).  The link to it is http://www.cbbbl.co.uk/ so you can see all the results on there.

After all the league games are played, the top four coaches in each division will go on to the play-offs to decide who the CBBBL VIII champion will be - and get their team name engraved on the league plaque.  The league starts on 3rd September 2015 so I've got a bit of time to get some practice games in before it all kicks off.  I can play around with the team lineups before this date too so I may change things around before then.

I have painted most of my Undead team although I do have some extra zombies and skeletons to paint as well as a few star players.  My Goblins are still being prepped for painting but I'll add pictures as soon as I get them done.

Mummies

Wights

Ghouls

Zombies

Lords of Midnight - Undead team