Talk about jumping into the deep end… I decided my first two-day Blood Bowl Tournament was to be the annual NAF Championship in Nottingham, a massive event host to 280 players with some of the biggest names in the Blood Bowl scene and a gruelling 6 games. As predominantly a league player I’ve only dabbled in a couple of 1-day local events, so it wouldn’t be unfair to say there was a pretty large gulf in experience between myself and opponents. Not necessarily in the game itself, but certainly in terms of just the raw capability and endurance needed for handling 6 incredibly time-sensitive and rules-tight games in quick succession.

Before we get into the match reports themselves, I just want to say a few thank yous. First, to the group of players I tagged along with from Tabletop Republic, particularly Nonumber (Tom) who was an enthusiastic and encouraging force throughout the entire weekend. Secondly to the guys from NAFC itself for putting on a fantastic weekend, I cannot fault the event in any way at all, the atmosphere was great and everything (seemingly from a player perspective) ran incredibly smoothly. My only comment (and one that was quite common) was the size of the squares of the supplied pitches, you’ll see from the photos below that they were more suited to the older 25mm bases rather than the modern 32mm + skill bands, so things got quite cramped. But, considering how many people were in the room it was completely understandable and a very minor quibble in the grand scheme of things and we got used to it after a game or two, everything else was pretty much spot on (and we got some cool freebies too)!

Lastly, all 6 of my opponents were fantastic (number 5 in particular was very patient with me and the fatigue that had set in by that point) and made for an incredibly pleasant and challenging weekend. I can’t say I’ve ever had a bad experience so far in a tabletop tournament setting and it made me incredibly happy to continue that streak of wonderful players over the weekend as well. Extra thanks to Lithium during game 6 for the gifted dice!

What a game to start with! Vampires I’ve found to be a quite the challenge with Amazons due to how good Hypnotic Gaze is against them, being able to turn off Dodge/Blodge on a 2+ for the most part negates one of our biggest advantages and the Vamps can really keep the pressure on at all times.

Having won the toss, I recieved first and played it quite safe for the first game, slowly walking up the pitch creating space and then putting the hammer down only towards the end of the drive for a 1-0. The vamps then attempted a 1 turner, but sadly a bit of misplacing meant the chainpush wasn’t on. This then led to a very quick score that the Zons couldn’t cope with despite getting a free shot at the ball carrier and knocking him down, but Hypno Gaze and AG2+ came to the rescue and the ball was easily thrown down the field for the equaliser.

With plenty of time to score I felt quite confident for the 2-1 and stuck to the same gameplan, pushing through the middle then darting down the left hand side to be in scoring range. The Vamps then decided they’d had enough Hyno Gazing which certainly made it easier, but with quite a few of them bearing down on my cage, I was forced to score on turn 15 rather than 16. As it was their drive, I thought 1 turn would be eaiser to defend but, with a Time-Out kick off event the Vamps got their much needed 2 turn attempt and as before, easily broke through for the 2-2.

Eventually the Snotlings managed to drop the ball and made an attempt to score in my Drive, but thankfully both of my Wrestle Blitzers were on the field to player an immense defence. As Titchy allows them to dodge into tackle zones without the negative modifiers, cage diving was the name of the game and managed to hold the line just long enough for the end of the half.

A reverse situation then occured during the Snotlings drive. One of the wagons drew the ire of the ref and was off the pitch and thanks to a fumbling of the ball, the Zons dived forwards to apply pressure to the backline. With a couple of Linewomen distracting the Trolls, Wagon and Ripper on the LoS, the Blockers and Blitzers piled into the Snotlings backline and with some more 3+ cage dives, the ball was loosened for a very scrappy Touchdown for the Zons.

With two turns left, Ripper was tasked with tossing a Snotling downfield for an equaliser, but his aim was sadly off, leaving the Zons with a very hard earned 1-0 win and the first of the weekend.

The backline Valkyrie managed a very well played, last ditch blitz on my ball carrier and thanks to Strip Ball, popped the ball onto the ground. Work needed to be done and unfortunately the Zons last reroll was spent trying to push a player out of the way for the Blitzer to move into the endzone. As we all know, the 1s appear just when you need to score and even after succefully picking up the ball, the Blitzer failed the single Rush needed to end the half 1-0, thus making it even at half time with the Norse drive coming next.

In much the same way with the Snotlings, the faster Amazons piled on the pressure and kept the ball firmly in the Norse half for the vast majority of the drive. However, the Amazon armour was starting the faulter and slowly the numbers were being pushed into the Norse’s favour. A couple of failed dodge meant not enough bodies were on the ball to stop the Valkyrie from picking it up and handing it off to a spare Lineman, who in stark contrast to the Amazon’s attempt, succeeded both of his rushes to end the game 0-1.

Despite the loss, this was the best game of the day, an incredibly tight affair where up unitl the final two turns I felt in control and was pressuring well for the win but the Norse just knicked it in the end and proved why you should always keep a player in scoring range!

Now for Day Two!