This may be the only tournament I attend this year, so I thought I'd post about it. It started as a side event for our league (the Cakebowl League) but we went NAF sanctioned and opened it up to everybody! We had 32 attendees which for a 1 day tournament is pretty good, I think.
I decided to take my Necromantic Undead team, as I'd had some good experience with them in league play. With 1,100k to spend I went for 2 Golems, 2 Werewolves, 2 Wights, 1 Ghoul and 4 Zombies, giving me 11 players and 3 re-rolls plus a Cheerleader and Assistant Coach.
I only took the one Ghoul because I'd had trouble protecting 2 in league play, and with no regeneration and low armour they are big targets. The limited skill slots was also another reason for not taking the 2nd Ghoul, as we were allowed 5 skills to add to the roster, one of which could be a double, so I played it simple and went for block on both Werewolves, the Golems and the Ghoul. This meant everyone on the team was a reliable hitter except for the 4 Zombies.
First picture is the tournament organiser Glowworm telling everyone to play nicely:
Next picture is the lovely silverware on offer at the tourney - the Cups are for 1st to 3rd place, with smaller custom trophies for Most Touchdowns, Most Casualties, Stunty Cup and the International Glowworm Award (also known as 4th Place), plus the amazing SCHWING award and Wooden Spoon:
Game 1
I got drawn against DDark, was part of the Exiles contingent who'd come up from Bournemouth. He was playing with Halflings and I was delighted to see that he was using the same models that I was using for my Necromantic team - the Deadlings produced by Impact Miniatures! I really love the team as the models are great and they're also able to be used to represent several of the Bloodbowl races, although in this particular game it was slightly confusing for me!
He'd taken 2 Treemen, Deeproot Strongbranch and 2 re-rolls along with a load of halflings and a Master Chef. For skills, he took Block on one Tree and Guard on the other, with Sidestep on 3 Halflings
Things got off to a good start when his Chef failed to steal a single reroll in the first half. I received the kick and blitzed upfield with a Werewolf, expecting that with all my Block skills and rerolls I should knock a few of the little fellas out of the game early before scoring.
Unfortunately my blocking dice were abysmal and I had failed to even knock down a
single Halfling throughout the whole first half! DDark is a very experienced player and I went into the
second half 0-1 down and defending - very aware that another good throw
teammate score could seal the game.
The 2nd half started pretty badly too - although his Chef only stole one re-roll, and my kick went deep so I didn't need to worry about a quick score - but the 3 Trees on the Line of scrimmage sent all 3 of my defending Zombies for a nap in the KO box in his first turn.
He failed to pick up the ball, and then fumbled a throw which allowed me an opportunity to steal the ball from 3 tacklezones (needing to roll a 5 or more), dodging and then handing off to equalise.
In the last drive, I marked the trees with the Golems, who proved to be more resilient and caused a few problems. I managed to steal the ball and again ran upfield to finish my first game on a 2-1 score.
Game 2
Still shaken a bit from my near defeat against the Halflings I was drawn against Hawk, who as Glowworm had pointed out to everybody was the only person not to gift-aid his paypal tournament entry. Hawk had come across from Essex to play, and had won his first game with 5 touchdowns. He was using Wood Elves and had 2 Wardancers, a Treeman, 2 Throwers, 1 Catcher and 5 Line Elves. He went with Strip Ball and Sidestep on the Wardancers, Kick on a Line Elf, Leader and Hail Mary Pass on the Throwers.
I elected to receive and a high kick close to the line of scrimmage and caged, but was promptly turned over when the Wardancer leapt into the cage, stripped the ball and collected it up. Some more elves dodged through the defense to pin players and he scored in his 2nd turn.... and again in his 4th turn employing exactly the same method.
I was able to regain a small amount of dignity with a score before the end of the first half. During this time the Wardancer also had failed a leap so one of my Zombies wasted no time and badly hurt him with a foul, being sent off in the process.
In the next half, the remaining Wardancer scored easily, hugging the sidelines to make the blitz really awkward. I received and pushed forward, but lost the ball in my opponent's half and Hawk used his Thrower with Hail Mary Pass to hoof it upfield and outdistance my defenders. He really put the pressure on and was rewarded with his 5th touchdown before the game ended. Result was 1-5 loss to me, and Hawk went on to win the Most Touchdown award which was very well deserved.
The game went fast, so I was able to take a picture while most other people were still playing:
Game 3
My last game was against Stu who is a local and a new member for our league. He took Dark Elves and had 2 Blitzers, 2 Witch Elves, an Assassin and 6 Line Elves. The Blitzers took Dodge and the Witches took Block, while the Assassin took Multiple Block.
Stu received and pushed down the sidelines, forgetting about the frenzy on my Werewolves. My kick had gone deep and I ran a Werewolf forward to intercept the ball carrier if possible. One of the blitzers fell victim to a crowd push and the fans obligingly injured him.
I managed to steal the ball for a score, and crowdpush another player before the 1st half ended
In the 2nd half, I collected the ball and caged up but then failed a handoff to a Wolf who was in scoring position so the Dark Elves were able to dodge through my line, pick up the ball and run off to score.
I received again and this time made myself a problem by frenzy pushing the Assassin next to my ball carrying Ghoul. The Assassin was knocked down, but stood up and stabbed the ball carrier for the blitz. Luckily he failed the armour roll and was also stood next to the sidelines so was shoved out and injured by the crowd in the next turn. I handed off to a Werewolf who galloped in for a second touchdown! Stu was running out of players by this time, and I had enough time to steal the ball and score again before the half ended, finishing the game 3-1
This gave me a 2-0-1 score for the day, but I'd not picked up many additional points which put me in 10th place out of 32 which I feel wasn't so bad!
I've now managed to get 3 different uses out of the same miniature! :-)
