Blood Bowl, Whats your team? Options

[nothen_knight]

Greetings all, EDIT: Thank you Plaguelord
With the advent of the Blood Bowl re-release on the 29th, me and my friends are interested/going to start our own teams (were going to get the game pack thing).
Ive picked Humans, but i was wondering if any long beards on this forum have any advice for a young upstart like me on playing the game and so on?
Ive downloaded the living rule book, Human play book and background and im midway thru trawling thru these mighty tomes.
Also how many people on this forum play Blood Bowl? and what teams do you have?

Thanks for your advice,
Ryan

This post has been edited by nothen_knight: Feb 12 2008, 09:18 PM

[The Nothas]

1 BB bears no resemblance to any code on this planet and attempting plays that work on Superbowl Monday will get you pwned.

2 This is prolly true because I play Halflings and their play book involves going 'squish' as infrequently as possible. heaven help them if the ball actually comes any where near them. But I do get to nick your rerolls

[Plaguelord Baldric]

just found the right area for this, can an admin move it for me please?

There you go.

[DarkHorse]

I play Chaos (slaaneshi colour scheme) - and I play BB like it is a game of bar room rugby union.

For the re-release I bought a lizardman team and have been tempted to get a throwing team of which I owuld pick humans too.

My best advice, from the few times i have played, be very wary about how close to the crowd you get - and watch out for the flying beastman torpedo headbutt!

[nothen_knight]

...Flying torpedo headbut?... is that where you throw a team mate at yout oponents team?

From the gist of whats been said so far with humans you go for the touch down, not the KO.

Thanks for the replies
Ryan

[DarkHorse]

Beastmen have horns which make them S4 on the blitz. So I got very fond of taking a running tackle on throwers if their blockers fell and caused a play turn over. Smashing them down in the backfield so they drop the ball and a few other free beastmen could swoop in/provide coverage was a favourite tactic - when it worked. I nicknamed it the flying headbutt and when a couple of my players got really good at it (block skill, sure footed) they got the nickname flying torpedo headbutt (like E Honda from SF2).

Humans are definately a team that plays football - not barroom brawl on grass. Humans have to play more of a passing, scoring game.

But like I said, I play chaos. The main strategy for them (partial because they dont have dedicated throwers, runners or catchers) is that they enemy can't score if they aren't concious. Put a big dent in their available players and then play running rugby with the ball. They dont tend to be high scoring games I have found but they are fun.

Orks vs humans or humans vs elves is a real running, throwing, catching games with good scores and lots of flowing play - but dont forget to hurt a few along the way. Don't let those big guys get away with too much.

[chunky04]

I've been a fairly successful Human player - IMO the WD Human playbook is a bit rubbish.

As a Human, your main advantages are speed, redundancy and lots of reroll skills.

Try and spread your skills around and create a nice, deep team - you won't tend to be able to make the super players others can anyways (unless you get very lucky with multiple stats on one player), so don't try. Rather, try and make it so that the loss of any one player doesn't hurt the team too badly.

With all the reroll skills available to you, you should be able to use your team rerolls for some of the more risky actions. Combine this with the aforementioned movement to put a lot of pressure on the opposition.

You are also able to switch to a bashy role against the lighter team like the elves of the world.

Blitzers with the Guard skill are probably the key to a good Human team. Their speed allows you to get good matchups where you want them, enabling to use your speed.

[Ratboy]

... I play Halflings and their play book involves going 'squish' as infrequently as possible ...

Pfft, the Crookback Boogers fear not going squish! Do you have any idea how many goblins there are running around the Old World?

We're not descriminating; as long as you're green, short and have ... erm ... no, that's it.

[zap123]

If you're playing in a league, make sure you slaughter any Wood Elf teams early (and by slaughter I mean the literal translation!). Watch out for teams who's only aim is to hurt you a lot, and teams with one turn touchdown ability.

Humans are neat all round....lots of Blitzers is a nice advantage, your catchers are quick and linemen cheap. You also get a decent option for defensive lynchpin that similar teams to you don't.

[choppy,choppy]

Lord scabbyknackers all stars, the greatest team of all. Well maybee not but GOD DO SKAVEN ROCK.
Take four gutter runners and play catch us if you can. Rack up spp faster than an ogre in a gobbo league.
AG 4, who needs throwers? What is not to like!

[nothen_knight]

0-16 Lineman 50k 6 3 3 8 - G ASP
0-4 Catcher 70k 8 2 3 7 Catch, Dodge GA SP
0-4 Blitzer 90k 7 3 3 8 Block GS AP
0-1 Ogre 140k 5 5 2 9
Bone-Head, Loner, Mighty
Blow, Thick Skull S GAPM

Having read the refrence sheets in the website i found these acronyms (the bigger letters) and i was wondering what the hell are they? what do they mean?

thanks

[tredhead]

0-16 Lineman 50k 6 3 3 8 - G ASP
0-4 Catcher 70k 8 2 3 7 Catch, Dodge GA SP
0-4 Blitzer 90k 7 3 3 8 Block GS AP
0-1 Ogre 140k 5 5 2 9
Bone-Head, Loner, Mighty
Blow, Thick Skull S GAPM

Having read the refrence sheets in the website i found these acronyms (the bigger letters) and i was wondering what the hell are they? what do they mean?

thanks

i think you will find their the Skill Catagoris that those players can improve now EG
G= general A= agility P= passing S= strength M= mutation E= extraodinary.

this is more so when your playing a full league and your player get better( some times) after each game.

page 26-27 cover this i think

This post has been edited by tredhead: Feb 13 2008, 08:19 PM

[drathul]

i think you will find their the Skill Catagoris that those players can improve now EG
G= general A= agility P= passing S= strength M= mutation E= extraodinary.

this is more so when your playing a full league and your player get better( some times) after each game.

page 26-27 cover this i think

thats right. they are the abreviations for the various skill catagories.
the first is the skill catagories that can be chosen on normal skill rolls. the letters after the space are those that can only be chosen if you roll a double when they get an advancement roll

I LOVE Blood bowl, its the only GW game I currently play.

[drathul]

BTW for more australia BB discussions go to www.ausbowl.com

There is a league starting up later this month in Sydney (near central station).
You are most welcome to join in and anyone in the league would be friendly, willing to answer any questions you have and provide as much advice as you need.

you can find the details on the ausbow site. just look for the SLOBB sub-forum

This post has been edited by drathul: Feb 14 2008, 08:55 AM

[nothen_knight]

Ah ok, so i shuld disregard them durin small matches (untill my friends get our league up).
Zap123 and TreadHead, what teams do you guys have?

[Lizard]

I have been playing almost since the release of DeathZone and have tried all teams except halflings, dead ones, chaos and chaos dwarf. Tbh my fav is easily the helfs, followed by the skaven. Different to most people, i do actually take a thrower, just to get that bit extra accuracy when ur starting to rack up the spp quicker, and once you get a few skills a helf thrower can make a long bomb pass on a 3+ (4+ for a rat thrower) with a reroll which is just awesome for sprinting catchers or gutter runners = 1-turn TOUCHDOWN.

Unless things have changed, helfs are just humans with a slightly higher cost and higher agility.

P.S. I agree with everyone else's comments about halflings, beastmen and welfs, but add that you should be wary of and wardancers as they can be a pain in the *&#% for a starting player to get rid of (they start with Block and Dodge)

[Paulus]

I play darkelves and necromanic teams. My mates play skaven and human.

Best way to deal with gutter runners are werewolves and witchelves, frenzy works wonders on them s2 speed machines.

This post has been edited by Paulus: Feb 14 2008, 04:48 PM

[nothen_knight]

Ok so what ive figured out from you guys is against same and higher str teams go for the touch down, and against wood elves, helfs and skaven block and harras as much as possible to stop the lil buggers. And against halfling just stand around and laugh?

What i had in mind for when we and me mate get the game box n have our first game is.
Run my catches and a couple of linemen or blitzers down the flank and leive my throwers lagging behind with what ever isnt goin for the touchdown zone.
This will force my opponent to either focus on one target and have a chance of it totally farking up on him or split his team one to take out my catchers and the other to take out my throwers.
And then basically do a long bomb and score.

Its a very rough idea i know

Thanks for the advice
Ryan

[DarkHorse]

The lesson i have learnt the most, is to know the real differences between BB and real sports - its not the tactics, it is the procedure. I play the mathhammers game in my head a bit, planning which block must go first to then make this block useful, then this one, then this blitz - because the actions are taken in order and if you throw that double skulls, your turn is over, not much you can do about it (without rerolls and stuff of course). So that strategic planning is important.

But the most important thing i have learned, you can read all the stuff in the world, listen to what other people say but nothing replaces taking to the field yourself, grabbing those dice and playing a game.

[doubleskulls]

IMO the best thing about Blood Bowl is the turnover rule. The brilliance is that when your turn goes wrong it ends - which means planning is crucial.

Generally do the safe things first (i.e. no dice rolls involved or things like 2 dice with block). Almost always this includes standing up any players who are lying down.

Then work out what the important things are and do them in order of importance, starting with the most important actions and then working your way down.

Tactically this is probably the single most important skill to learn. There are other bits and pieces - e.g. effective blocking, positioning, cage formation/movement etc.

For almost everyone the best skills are block, dodge and guard.

With humans you are a middling team with a tendancy towards a passing game. So against the purer passing teams you ought to be able to out bash them, against the bashier teams you ought to be able to outplay them. Effectively switching tactics based on the opponent is a difficult skill to master (chunky04 was very good at it) which can make humans difficult to play in highly skilled leagues.

There is lots of help/advice available both on ausbowl (http://www.ausbowl.com/index.php) and talk blood bowl (http://www.talkbloodbowl.com/)