Hold onto your beards and horned helmets, today we’re looking at the New Norse Team, for the updated Blood Bowl 2020 ruleset!

First things first, look at these beautiful minis. The recent sets have been absolutely fantastic, hats off to GW for these and the entire range of 2020 sets so far, I’m really enjoying them. The star players are fantastic too, who’s rules you can find on the Warhammer Community FAQ page, we’ll have a look at these in the future.

In terms of the new norse team themselves we’ll be going through each positional one by one and taking a look at the changes from the original roster as well as some comments as to what we think of them. So let’s begin with the new Norse Blood Bowl Rules!

Norse Raider Linemen | New Norse Team Rules for Blood Bowl 2020

The good ol’ Norse Linemen get quite the change in their new ruleset. The biggest one is the new Drunkard rule, which gives a -1 to the player when they attempt a Rush/GFI. This means you won’t ever be Rushing with the Linemen as you have a 1 in 3 chance of falling down, really limiting their movement and cementing them even more as marker pieces. It’s not a bad change and I do find it thematic and fun, plus it’s not a huge impact on the team seeing as you usually used these guys in the marker or assist role anyway. It’s worth noting that in a Blizzard, you’ll need to make your Rushes on a 3+ with these guys, which is quite frankly a horrifying concept!

They also get Thick Skull which is a nice buff, keeping them on the field longer and hopefully keeping your team intact longer too. One of the issues with Norse previously was your team’s removals could snowball thanks to their low armour, leaving you with very little to play with and thus overrun. While Thick Skill won’t entirely solve this, it will help mitigate it and is a welcome addition to these players, especially whilst remaining at 50k.

A small change that seems to have gone unnoticed is the addition of Passing being added to their secondary list. Again not a big change, you’re not exactly going to be spending SPP on Passing skills when the entire Strength category is right there, but I guess you could toss Leader on a Raider if you want to.

Overall, they still fulfil the usual linemen role and with Block, they’re still gonna be useful for hitting things and getting hit themselves, the latter of which they can do much better now

Beer Boar | New Norse Team Rules for Blood Bowl 2020

Contender for miniature of the year for sure, the Beer Boar is a brand new player for the Norse team and brings yet another unique rule in Pick-Me-Up. At the end of your opponent’s turn, roll a D6 for each Prone non-Stunned teammate within three squares of a Beer Boar and on a 5+, the Prone player may immediately stand up. 

This is interesting and so far seems to be getting mixed reviews. The Boar itself can’t really contribute to the game with its base stats, what with basically being a Gnoblar but without Side-Step, so it makes for a poor assist or marking piece and thus reliant on PMU being effective. A 5+ does seem quite balanced on the face of things, I think a 4+ would maybe push it into being too good, but it’s very reliant on the Boars being in the right place at the right time along with your players not having their armour broken, which on an 8+ is going to be fairly frequently. For 20k you could do a lot worse and they’re a really, really fun piece and I’m so very happy they exist, I’d definitely consider taking one on the team for that price, but after I’ve got my 11 base players. I’d keep them for your defensive drive as I feel that’s when they’re going to be the most useful as you’ll be the one taking hits first.

With Agility being their only skill access (on secondaries too, oof!) they’re going to have no progression really. If they do level up, you’re gonna want either Side Step or Defensive maybe to give them a bit more utility, but I’d probably refrain from levelling them up at all. Not that they’ll be getting SPP outside of the odd MVP anyway.

Again, I absolutely LOVE them, but I’m not sure if they’re any better than having an extra Raider Linemen.

Norse Berserker | New Norse Team Rules for Blood Bowl 2020

No changes to the Berserker with the exception of getting Passing as a secondary. They’re gonna do their Berserker things as normal and cause all manner of problems for both your opponent and yourself with Frenzy.

Norse Valkyrie | New Norse Team Rules for Blood Bowl 2020

A new player of sorts, the Valkrie essentially combines the old Thrower and Catcher into a pretty awesome package for 95k. What the price they come with a great set of skills and versatility reminiscent of the old Brettonian knights. They do lack Block, but they’ll be getting that easily in a few games, along with Dodge to make them some amazing players. Pass is really the only miss here, Norse are not a passing team and even with PA3+ you’re not going to want to rely on it, but it does provide you with the option if you find yourself stuck. Dauntless and Strip Ball are the biggest draws for me and with MA7, you can make some effective Ball Hawks to the point where I’d consider giving one of these ladies Wrestle to lean into the role more. Catch is for your handoffs as opposed to full-on passes and with their speed, you can really make the most of this.

I’m quite excited about these players, they give Norse some decent ball-handling which they sorely lacked before and nicely condenses two positionals which were the least fun part of the old team. I think 95k is an absolute steal for the Valkryie and I can think of some really good ways to develop them.

Norse Ulfwerener | New Norse Team Rules for Blood Bowl 2020

No changes for the Ulfwerener, they remain the same high strength frenzy piece as always. The only thing now is, for me at least, they drop below the Valkryie in terms of priority when building a team. S4 is very good of course but their spot is very much under threat with the Valkryie’s utility being so good, especially as neither player has Block and Frenzy presents the bigger risk, S4 or not.

They’re still good and if I can fit them in I will but they’ve definitely dropped down below the Valkryie and the Berserker for me in terms of who I’m adding to the Norse team first.

Norse Yhetee | New Norse Team Rules for Blood Bowl 2020

The Yhetee gains a point of Agility! Not a massive change considering Break Tackle is still the better choice, but hey they now have a 50/50 chance to get out of Tackle Zones or picking up the ball…. not bad I say!

Special Rules | New Norse Team Rules for Blood Bowl 2020

A couple of other points. ReRolls stay the same price and they gain “Favoured of….(choice of Chaos” as opposed to the “Lustrian Superleague”. I believe the latter is a correction seeing as Norse in Warhammer have historically been chaos aligned.

Conclusion of the New Norse Team

Overall I like the changes. Raider Linemen have a bit more about than others than being, just Linemen with Block, even if they have a hindrance. Valkyries are a really fun and good change to the team, condensing the Thrower and Catcher was smart and it feels both thematic and competitive, plus they have some very nice minis to boot. The Boars, the more I think about them the harder it gets to be excited. I adore the model and the rules and thankfully they’re costed cheap enough that taking one is just fine, but I don’t think we’ll see many which is such a shame. Not all players have to be good of course and here at GRUMBBL we always value fun over effectiveness, but I just wish they were a little better so that we could have more fun with them.

Hopefully, you enjoyed our little look into the new Norse Team for Blood Bowl 2020, the customary team builds will be coming soon as well as the player builds!