If you didn’t know, there’s a new edition of Blood Bowl on the horizon, bringing with it a number of changes that look to really shake up the game. One of these is the new Blood Bowl Passing change, as throwing the ball is no longer affected by the Agility stat of a player, but the new Passing stat. This coincides with a change to how some of the stats are viewed, for example, AG4 is now shown as AG 2+, so you see the target roll rather than a value to compare to a chart. The same goes for AV and the new PA (Passing) stat.

Blood Bowl passing also has a new table to reflect the new stat:

Quick pass = 0
Short pass = -1
Long pass = -2
Long Bomb = -3

What we’ve seen as well, is dedicated Throwers are getting 2+/3+ to Passing, while non-throwers who previously had AG4 (so were good at throwing themselves) are now being given PA 4+, examples of this being Gutter Runners and non-thrower Elves. At the moment (as of 6th August 2020), we’ve only seen leaks of Wood Elves in terms of typical AG4 teams, so it remains to be seen if more passing focused Elves like High & Union are 4+ or 3+.

So… what exactly does the new Blood Bowl Passing mean?

For a start, we’re definitely going to be seeing Throwers in most teams, at least in those who want the passing option. Humans for example, seem to get a little bit of a buff here, as their Thrower has gone from throwing on a 3+ (before modifiers) to a 2+, making a passing game just that little bit more viable. We may even see more Throwers being taken on the pitch itself, particularly on Attack. Before you’d maybe take one, but I can see some teams potentially taking two. One would remain in the backfield to pick up the ball, then one in the middle to receive a hand-off then pass to a catcher further on. It seems they have become more expensive, but I think most players would be happy to have the option at least.

I do think Elf BS will still be on the table. Catching is still a 2+ and you needed Hand-Offs anyway to make those long plays, but we may just see those throwers positioned a little further up the pitch compared to where we’re used to seeing them. Combined with the new Running Pass skill, (Player may move after they’ve made a Pass Action) I think Elves will still remain the mobile scoring threats they’ve always been, perhaps even more so with stuff like Running Pass & Fumblerooskie allowing for more variety in moving the ball around. Fumblerooskie could be fun as well, again as Pick Ups will remain a 2+. As an Elf player, I’m not too worried at all by the changes, in fact, it may shake things up and open up some cool new strategies to try out! I’m not entirely convinced the passing change has “nerfed” the Elf teams, although the new injury changes might do (we’ll see how that plays out when we actually get our hands on the game!)

One thing we’ll probably see less of with regular Elf players getting 4+ instead of 3+ is Vanity Passes for +1 SPP. It may still happen but it’ll be much risker to have your Wardancer try to pass the ball for a cheeky level up.

We’re yet to see the PA’s for most of the other players, so it’ll be interesting to see how the other teams cope with this. Bashy teams probably won’t be affected much as they often played a running game anyway. I’m quite interested in how “Runner” players are statted, like Dark Elf Runners, Dwarf Runners etc. I imagine they might get a 3+ similar to the Nobility Thrower, (they may get something like Running Pass as well). I personally would love to see Halfling Treemen get a 4+ just to make Team Mate Throwing even better…. but I think they’ll come out at 5+ (so a 4+ roll if they retain Strong Arm as they have done in the Woodie Roster).

Overall I think it’s a good change, it definitely makes sense to me that blood bowl passing gets split from Agility. If any of you have watched Sports on TV, you’ll know that just because you’re nimble and fast, it doesn’t mean that necessarily you have the skills to pass a ball! Mostly I’m a fan of how the stat is now just a roll rather than a value. We all knew that a player needed to make X+ roll to do something, it’s just nice that the rules now reflect it rather than it being;  Pickup with AG3 = 4+, +1 for Picking Up, so it’s now a 3+…… this way is just tidier and easier to work out.