Warm up game vs Dark Elves

Another warm up game on the FUMBBL client, this time against Barry, one of my fellow club committee members.  Barry has played a lot of FUMBBL games in the past (well over 150 in fact) but it had been a couple of years since he played last, one of which was against me.  Barry is trying out a Dark Elf team so it was a good test of how my rookie team would fare against an AG4 team.

I received the kick but Barry's agile elves soon made short work of my poor defensive positioning - my dice rolls were abysmal too and I'd burned both my rerolls before turn three.  Barry scored on his turn three and I knew I had my work cut out from there!  My dwarves went to work and hurt some of his linemen which helped give me a chance to equalise at the end of the first half.

I was kicking to Barry but he had only eight players vs my ten - so I was hopeful that I could turn him over.  Alas - it was not to be.  Despite my best efforts, Barry punched though my lines and scored again - his elves seemingly incapable of rolling anything other than sixes.  I had time to equalise but one of Barry's blitzers managed to take out the hobgoblin ball carrier and it all went wrong from there on.  The game ended 2-1 to him - a well deserved win for him.

So - I'm not quite sure where this leaves me with the team.  I think they're sound enough - it's just my coaching that is letting the side down.  Oh dear.  More practice, I think... One cool thing about the FUMBBL game is that a bull centaur got a skill and rolled +1 AG!  If that happens in the live league I won't complain...

Score - 2-1 loss

My team : 2 x bull centaurs, 6 x chaos dwarfs, 3 x hobgoblins, 2 x rerolls, apothecary

Barry's team : 3 x blitzers, 1 x witch elf, 7 x linemen, 2 x rerolls

Warm up game vs Skaven part II

I can't get to the club this week (something about the club meeting coinciding with my wedding anniversary) so Rodders and I had another warm-up game using the FUMBBL Blood Bowl client.  FUMBBL is an online way of playing Blood Bowl against an opponent via a Java game client - it's free to use and it's been running for years.  I've been signed up on it since 2005 but I only had my first game on it back in 2011 - so this game against Rodders would be only my second.

We both set up our existing CBBBL teams on there although I have made a change to my roster - I removed a hobgoblin and a reroll and bought a sixth chaos dwarf and an apothecary.

The weird thing for me about FUMBBL is that the game is played sideways - and I'm one of those people who've only ever played tabletop Blood Bowl with the board facing me.  It took me a few turns to get used to the format!  With FUMBBL, you also need to ensure that you decide what you want to do with a player before you select the action - so if you want to have a player pick up the ball and hand off to another, you have to choose that option from the menu; you can't choose move and then decide to hand off at the last minute.  This is a more accurate way of how Blood Bowl should be but I think the coaches at my club are a little more forgiving than the rules state.

Rodders received the kick and immediately set about being tricksy with his rats, knocking over my defensive line and getting his gutter runners deep into my backfield.  By turn three, he'd scored which was very early - he wasn't able to stall as I'd kept a bull centaur back as a defence.  I now had quite a lot of the half left to try to equalise - and I did manage to do that in the end although Rodders was making it very difficult despite having a number of knocked out players.  In the second half, the lack of numbers was starting to hurt him as my team started beating his up.  I did lose a hobgoblin to a -1 AG injury - I chose to not use the apothecary though as in the CBBBL league I will be saving him for the bull centaurs.  Hobgoblins are cheap so they can be replaced... I did, however, manage to kill one of Rodders blitzers which was harsh on him.  Towards the end, he had so few players left that I was in total control of the game - I even managed to get a hobgoblin to hand off to a bull centaur so he could score.

So - a 2-1 win to the Chaos Dwarfs over the Skaven and I'm thinking I'll keep my lineup for the CBBBL start.  Only having two rerolls is a risk but, as Rodders pointed out after our game last week : "You should only use a reroll if you really do need to score or stop the opponent scoring - if you're trying something desperate then you've already lost but you don't know it yet."

Score - 2-1 win

My team : 2 x bull centaurs, 6 x chaos dwarfs, 3 x hobgoblins, 2 x rerolls, apothecary

Rodders' team : 2 x blitzers, 4 x gutter runners, 1 x thrower, 3 x linemen, rat ogre, 2 x rerolls

Warm up game vs Skaven

I had a game tonight against Rodders who was using his Skaven team.  Rodders is the most experienced BB coach at my club - he's a NAF regional tournament organiser, has run the Carrot Crunch tournament in Sudbury for years and is a great guy to boot.  I must admit, I didn't fancy my chances against him as he's a tough enough opponent even when he's not playing Skaven.  Still - I'll never turn down a chance to play him as it's a great opportunity to test myself against a pro and learn something into the bargain.

The kick-off went my way and I chose to received, hoping to thin down the Skaven numbers before they had a chance to do anything - but my blocking was totally ineffective.  The best I could do was push over a blitzer.  To add insult to lack of injury, my hobgoblins fumbled the ball pickup.  Feeble.  Rodders had a host of gutter runners on his team and they swarmed forward whilst his rat ogre blitzed a hobgoblin, killing him instantly.  Oh dear.  This was not going well...

Somehow I managed to back track and get some players around the ball and the rest of the half descended into a punch up.  Rodders was making canny blitzes in an attempt to pop the ball free and I was doing my best to cover his players and clear some off the field.  I did manage to kill one of his linemen so at least we had even numbers.  The rest of the turn played out and we were level a nil-nil.

For turn two I had ten players to his eight - but with the Skaven receiving I was sure they would score before I had a chance to blink.  I kicked a touchback too which didn't help things.  I was lucky though as Rodders started having bad dice rolls and his rats started failing actions.  I managed to blitz his ball carrier and a hobgoblin grabbed the ball and headed up field.  It was Rodders turn to back track this time - and to ensure that I had no option of ball-stalling, he half-die blitzed my hobgoblin with a gutter runner.  He rolled a defender stumbles and a push - so I had to chose the push which forced my hobgob into the endzone to score.  At least it allowed Rodders a few turns to equalise.

Another kick-off from me and I rolled a Perfect Defence, allowing me to reposition my players which really helped.  Rodders had burned both his rerolls and I had superior numbers - so this really started to tell in the final turns.  All my blocking and blitzing was taking a toll on his rats and, in the end, he just didn't have enough bodies on the field to stop a hobgoblin handing off to a bull centaur and having him score.

So - an unexpected 2-0 win to me in the end but I'm still not convinced on my ability to coach this team well.  Maybe when they start getting some skills I may be more reliable on them but as a starting team, I'm still struggling.  Still - a win's a win :)

Score - 2-0 win

My team : 2 x bull centaurs, 5 x chaos dwarfs, 4 x hobgoblins, 3 x rerolls

Rodders' team : 2 x blitzers, 4 x gutter runners, 1 x thrower, 3 x linemen, rat oger, 2 x rerolls

Warm up game vs Orcs

Although I've played Blood Bowl since the 2nd edition, I started playing it regularly since 2006.  As such, I know my way around a BB pitch and I've tried to help the newer players at the club to develop their tactics so they don't get thrashed and lose interest.  That does nobody any favours.  So, this Wednesday, I scheduled a warm up league game with Harvey and his Orc team.  Harvey is a great guy and seasoned wargamer but he's only been playing BB for a year or so.  I thought I could give him a game to help him remember the rules and get to grips with some of the tactics, such as pointing out where he could maximise the effectiveness of blocking and positioning of his players.  It would also help me get used to my team so I knew what to look out for.

As it happened, what I needed to look out for was being rubbish at rolling dice!  I kicked to Harvey and his Orcs pummelled my guys a bit and some fell over.  My players got up and tried to stop Harvey from moving forward.  That was what happened for pretty much the whole first half except that one of my Chaos Dwarfs got injured so I was a man down.  Harvey scored in his turn 8.  In my turn 8, Harvey kicked a blitz and knocked out a Hobgoblin.  In the 2nd half, the hobgob got back onto the field to give me 10 men which was something.  Harvey kicked a blitz again and his guys again pummelled my team.  My hobgobs fumbled the pickup and wasted a reroll.  The orcs commenced punching again...  After a long struggle, I managed to get the ball to a Bull Centaur in range of the end zone.  He just needed to make two go for it's to score and he had Sure Feet to make it easy.  I got cocky and rolled both dice simultaneously.  Snake eyes.  Oh dear.

The good points of the game is that Harvey enjoyed playing his team and I think I helped him with remembering some rules and how he could do things better - I just need to get some new dice that don't hate me ;)

Score - 1-0 loss

My team : 2 x bull centaurs, 5 x chaos dwarfs, 4 x hobgoblins, 3 x rerolls

Harvey's team : 4 x blitzers, 4 x black orc blockers, 1 x thrower, 2 x linemen, 3 x rerolls

An old team for a new season

This is going to be a micro-blog for the Zharrduk Zephyrs, my Chaos Dwarf team in a new season of Blood Bowl at my wargaming club.  I did a blog like this last year for my Chaos team 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 work their way though ten games of brutal gridiron action.  I'm using Chaos Dwarfs this year purely because I've had this team for years and never managed to get to grips with how to use them effectively.  It's high time I pulled my finger out and learnt how to play them then...

The league I play in is called CBBBL - the Chelmsford Bunker Blood Bowl League - and I 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.

Like last year, the top four players in the league will go on to the play-offs to decide who the CBBBL VI champion will be - and get their team name engraved on the league plaque.  I must admit, I'm not sure how well I'm going to do this year so I'm not confident on aiming to get into the playoffs, let alone strive for the champion title.  If I end up placed in the top third of the league I will be happy.

The league starts on 30th October 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 lineup before this date too so I may change things around before then.

At present my lineup is :

2 x Bull Centaurs
5 x Chaos Dwarf Blockers
4 x Hobgoblins
3 x Rerolls
20K in the treasury to help save for an apothecary after game 1

All that's left to do is post up some pictures of the team - I'll get the bases numbered before the start of the season!

Obligatory team shot

Bull Centaurs

Chaos Dwarf Blockers

Chaos Dwarf Blockers

Hobgoblins

Minotaur

Hthark the Unstoppable

Rashnak Backstabber

Zzharg Madeye