Blood Bowl Game 2: Chaos Dwarfs vs. Undead

Blood Bowl:  The AGBBL (Adventurer's Guild Blood Bowl League) season is in full force.   My Chaos Dwarf team, Public Enemy took to the pitch against the Undead team Rottington Deadskins of my good friend and Blood Bowl veteran, Jamie "Force Commander".  

Chaos Dwarfs are a fun team with a lot of options.   You have Chaos Dwarf blockers, who come with skils Block & Tackle from the start, and Thick Skull as well, so they are only stunned on an injury roll of an 8, and knocked out on a 9, instead of being KO'd on both an 8 or 9.     You can have up to 6 of them, and 2 Bull Centaurs.  The Bulls are the key to the team.  High Strength, fast movement, tough armor, and the added skills of Sprint and Sure Feet allow them to become Uber-Blitzers that can move 9 and really hammer your opponents.    Sadly, I lost one in my first game of the season, killed on the pitch against the Dark Elves.

So, i'm down one Bull, but I have several hobgoblins as well.  Sure, they are just generic players with generic skills, but sometimes it's just enough.   With an average agility skill, but better than the bull and dwarfs, they would have to be my ball handlers this game.

We set up, weather perfect, fans on my side, winning the FAME roll from  fan factor, my team was set to be cheered on to vicotry.   Being allowed an additional 110,000 gold coins in inducements due to the loss of my bull, I opted for the "Bloodwieser Babe", who's tastey refreshments would allow any of my Knocked Out players to return to play on a 3+ on a d6, instead of a 4+.    We spent 50,000gp more on a card from the deck of Miscellaneous Mayhem and got a bonus: "That Girl's Got Talent", where local females from an exotic bar my team frequented decided to show their support and play the role of cheerleaders for my team.  This gave me an additional +1 to FAME rolls on the kick off table results, ensuring that we would win every roll from Brilliant coaching, cheering fans, ect, and gain additional bonus Rerolls.   Sweet!

This looked to be a  simply drive for me down the field.   The Undead team was pretty generic as well.  2 Large Mummies, slow but strong.   2 Wights, the blitzers of the team, both had the Block skill, but one was upgraded with Dodge (making it, what we call a "Blodger").    2 Ghouls for ball handling filled out the skilled positions and the rest of the players were nothing more than slow, sluggish zombies.    Even down the bull centaur, I looked optomistic to my situation.

We won the coin toss and elected to Hit First....er I mean Receive the ball.    Kick off result was "Cheering Fans" and Public Enemy gained a bonus reroll, giving me 4 for the half.   3 Zombies on the line of scrimmage didnt' know what hit them as the Dwarf Blockers did their job and pushed the back with "Pows" on the dice.   I established a line of control on the right side of the field and moved my hobgoblins up to cover the ball.

Than the problems started.   Razor Raze, hobgoblin #9 (yes, so named after rapper Flavor Flav), fumbled the ball, used a team ReRoll, and fumbled again.    Turn 2, same thing.   Fumbled the ball twice.   This would become a recurring theme all game.

(Razor Raze.....Hobgoblin #9 "The Clocka-Rocka")

My inability to pick up the ball allowed Jamie to move his Undead into position to bottle me up.   He got too agressive though, looking to strike at me hard, and brought all of his men up close.   What he didn't do was leave a player or two deep to play a "Safety" position, just like in real football defenses.

After another turn, Razor Raze got to the ball and handed it off to Sir-Hits-A-Lot, #12.   I had 2 options at this point.   Run through a gap in the defense and make a dodge roll on a 3+ (with a reroll) and cut through, or pull the end-around, and sweep left.    I chose the safter option and swept left, using a lone chaos dwarf and hobgoblin as blockers.     It started to work.

The undead forces committed too many forces too far advanced, and I had an opening on the left side.    My Chaos Dwarf blocker opened up the lane, blitzing the Ghoul trying to hold my hobgoblin back with a tackle zone on him.   Once cleared, I ran the hobgoblin as far as I could, "going-for-it" twice, giving me 8 spaces of movement.  

The undead closed the gap and tried to tie my runner up and slow me down.    Blast it, the gamble worked and the blitzing Wight scored a "pow" on a one-die blitz, and than stunned the hobgoblin with the blow.   The ball was loose and kept bouncing towards the endzone, just next to the out of bounds line.

Next turn I had another shot at it.  Cleared the ball of opponents, had another hobgoblin able to get to the ball, and of course, it was Razor Raze again, and he fumbled the ball again....one more square closer to the endzone.    When you fail to pick up the ball, your turn ends on what is called a "turnover" and was now my opponents time to strike.

Again the Wight blitzer took his shot.  This time Razor Raze got sent out of bounds into the fans, who subsequently beat him up and he would miss the rest of the game being "Badly Injured".    This drive would see another hobgoblin injured and the ball bouncing around, until the Wight  failed to picked it up, this time leaving it in the endzone.

I had one shot left.   I chose to blitz with the Bull Centaur, who had to dodge away from opponents a few turns earlier.   I got lucky on those dodge rolls and now he was in position to save the day.    I could blitz with the bull and knock the wight away from the loose ball in the endzone and than either use him to pick it up on a 4+, or move the journeyman Hobgoblin 6 spaces, go for it once on a 2+, and than pick up the ball on a 3+.

I chose to use the hobgoblin.    The Bull Centaur blitzed the ball clear, and while guarding it, left room for the hobgoblin to pick up the ball and score a touchdown.    All I needed was to go for it once (2+ roll), and than pick it up on a 3+.    Turn 8.  out of rerolls.   I rolled a "1" for the Go-For-It roll, the hobgoblin tripping onto the ball and knocking it out of bounds, where the fans, all to happy to cause more mayhem, threw the ball back to the middle of the field.

The first half would end, 0-0.    Public Enemy would kick off to the Rottington Deadskins, down 2 players, as 2 of their hobgoblins were injured for the rest of the game.    The Deadskins, who had a number of zombies knocked out by some hard hitting blocks from the Chaos Dwarfs, regained all of their players due to their regeneration abilities.

The second half started with a gust of wind picking up, and the ball scattered just to the left sideline.   The Deadskins front line flattened two Chaos Dwarf blockers but only managed to push back the Hobgoblin Journeyman (Journeymen are extra players added to your roster if you start the match below 11 players, to fill out your team to the sacred Nuffle number of 11).

Playing down 9 players to 11, Public Enemy tried every trick they could to stop the Deadskins.   In a variant of the classic "cage" style offense, the Undead forces started to turn the field and march down the right sideline.    The Ghouls fast and agile, were moving the ball well.    In a cleverly calculating move, the Chaos Dwarfs managed to create a hole in the line of protection of the undead, and a Chaos Dwarf got free on a blitz onto the Ghoul with the ball.   He had an assist, so it was a 2-Dice block.   Result: 1 skull, 1 push.   P.E. used a team reroll, and the result again was a double-push.   All they could do was push the Ghoul towards the sideline, failing to knock him down and the ball loose.

That would prove to be the game breaking play.  Failing to put the Ghoul down with 4 dice, it wasn't too difficult for the Undead to push the Chaos Dwarf away and clear the lane for the Ghoul to score the first touchdown of the game.    Had P.E. scored at the end of the first half, this game would be tied.

That was the end of the Undead turn 6.   Public Enemy would receive the ball with 3 turns to go (6, 7, 8).   The fans though, were clearly unhappy.  A riot broke out (kick off table result), and the referees were forced to move the clock back, resetting at turn 5 for Public Enemy.   4 turns should be enough time to pull out a tie.   Except that the Chaos dwarfs were down 4 Hobgoblins now and only had 7 players to put onto the field.   7 vs. 11.   I thought, maybe, I can do this.

It was a deep kick.   Too deep.   Almost out of bounds.   Out of bounds would have been perfect, as that becomes a touchback and you can give the ball to any player.   I would have clearly gave the ball to the Bull Centaur and I could have scored in 2 turns.

But the ball stayed in bounds.    I crushed the front line of the undead and sent the bull centaur and one lone hobgoblin downfield into scoring range for passes.    The lone journeyman hobgoblin #17 made his way to the ball and picked it up.    I would spend the next turn moving players into position and trying to keep undead blitzers from coming near my ball carrier.   Unfortunately when I went to pass the ball, I needed to Go-For-it (recurring theme here) 2 more spaces to shorten the difficulty from a Long-bomb to a Long-Pass.    Of course, I rolled another "1" and the hobgoblin fell and fumbled the ball.

The undead would manage to swarm the ball with 2 zombies and a Ghoul, who ended up fumbling the ball again.   Now down to my turn 8.  I had one last desperate chance.    I pushed a ghoul into the ball, hoping to bounce it away from the zombies, as it was sitting in 3 tackle zones.    The ball bounced and ended up in the hands of the ghoul after bouncing 3 squares amid the zombies.    That was it, I had used my blitz and had no way to get the ball out of his hands.     All I could do was just prevent him from scoring again, and take the loss 0-1.

It was an incredibly frustrating and sloppy game.  Which meant it was tremendous fun seeing players tripping all over the field.    The dice failing both of us at the oddest times.    My opponent failed his share of dodge and Go-for-it dice rolls as well.   He just made less mistakes, got luckier than I did.  

And that's how the ball bounces in Blood Bowl.     I open up the season 0-2, something I dont' think I've ever done.   With this being a short 8-game season, I have to step up my game play if I am to make the playoffs.

My team gained 70,000 gold to add to the 90,000 in the treasury.   A bull Centaur costs 130K, and a Minotaur 150K.   I went with the Minotaur.  Why you ask?  Simple.  I need to really start clearing the pitch and a Minotaur is strong and harder hitting (with Mighty Blow skill and Frenzy) and will allow me more chances to clear opponents off the field.      Terminator-X, my Minotaur will help me win.   Terminator-X only speaks with his hands.  (and horns!).