Ah, Snotlings. The most miserable and un-intimidating beings to ever crawl out of… well anywhere really. But what they lack in strength, they make up for in numbers, mischief, and downright stupidity (often mistaken for intelligence amongst their kind). A newer roster to Blood Bowl, I reckon the Season 2 rules buff them up quite a bit to make them… well still probably the worst of teams to be honest, but better than before!

Now let’s get one thing clear before we start. If you’re playing to win, don’t play Snotlings. If you’re easily upset, don’t play Snotlings. If you want to learn the core mechanics of Blood Bowl, probably don’t play Snotlings. But if you want a team that’ll be as fun and ridiculous to play as all the other stunties combined, then by Nuffle are Snotlings the team for you!

Now you may have noticed there are 3 parts to this guide, for good reason. Because Snotlings are so damn cheap, combined with the fact they have the ‘Low-Cost Lineman’ rule (meaning that their linemen’s purchase cost doesn’t add to your team value), you just have so much Treasury/TV advantage over your opponent that there are so many options to go with! Coupled with half-price bribes and you are literally rolling in inducements. So what I’ve done is grouped these options into 3 ‘sections’ each of which will cover some of the core features behind them, and over the course of the 3 articles, you’ll get an idea of some of the nonsense that Snotlings can pull off. Ultimately, they’re surprisingly versatile in their pre-game options so it’s worth familiarizing yourself with the Inducements section of your rulebook, as you’ll become intimate with many of those choices throughout your (likely short-lived) Snotling Career.

tl;dr:

• Snotlings are Tier 3, meaning they’re a tough team to play and a tougher team to win with
• Snotlings are super cheap, and can generally be an inducement heavy team
• Low Cost Linemen mean your Linemen’s cost doesn’t add to your CTV, meaning even more inducement money!
• Bribes only cost you 50k
• I came up with 9 different builds so we’ve split this build article into 3, each focusing on a different mechanic or theme

Basic Beginnings:

These first 3 Variants are what I’m deeming the more ‘standard’ builds of Snotlings. These are builds which look to utilise your roster itself, rather than relying on inducements (although you’ll still get a few). The advantage of this is they’re more reliable. If you come up against another low TV team such as another stunty team, or a team that’s taken a beating and lost a player or two, then your team largely remains unchanged. Additionally, these builds are better for ‘developing’ your players (although the chances of a Snotling living to develop is about as likely as their chance to win an arm wrestle with a Minotaur). That said, there are certainly a few key skills that can provide a nice boost to your positionals if you are so inclined.

Finally, You’ll notice there are 3 ‘Totals’ values. The first is how much gold you’ll spend during team creation. The second is your Current Team Value (CTV), as thanks to the Low-Cost Linemen rule, the linemen do not count towards your TV. Using the CTV, I have assumed you’ll be playing in a league and initially against TV1000ish teams, so have provided suggested inducements along with their total, aiming to hit around 1000TV post inducements. Now remember kids, you start with 1,000,000 gold, so anything not spent initially is in your treasury and no longer affects your TV. Therefore, keep that safe and use it to top up your inducement money as/when you need based upon your opponent! (Though be aware of expensive mistakes that can drain a bulging treasury).

Without further ado, onto the nonsense!

All The Things, 3 ReRolls | TV1000 Snotling Starting Rosters:

The name says it all really. This build gets you all your players, a full roster of 16, along with 3 Rerolls. At some point we’ll have a separate article explaining how to utilise the different positionals and how the team works as a whole, but this roster lets you get all the boys and all the toys. You have 3 Rerolls, which I personally feel is solid for the majority of teams. Considering you have dodge across the board, with Titchy and Stunty on your lineman and stunty on the rest of your Snot Positionals you’ll be dodging anywhere on a 2+ and 3+ respectively, so, you’re unlikely to use the team rerolls on dodges. They’re mainly going to be there for pick-ups, landings and the odd block from a Snot. Thanks to your standard lineman having Swarming, you’ll have 12-14 players on the pitch initially, so assisting your bigger guys into 3-die blocks shouldn’t be too hard.

The key inducements here are Bribes and a Biased Referee. 4 of your 16 git roster have secret weapons (the Flingas and Wagons), so you’ll have to manage them well to get the most use out of them. Whilst you have 16 players, you’re gonna lose them fast, so eventually, you’ll be forced to field those weapons. The Bribes will help you keep these on as long as possible, as will the Biased Referee. The big thing with the Biased Referee is it gives you a +1 to the Argue the Call ability. Normally if you have a player sent off, you Roll a D6 and on a 6+ they get to stay due to your loudmouth coach. Now, with a Ref in your pocket, you gain +1 to that roll, good odds for any ​Greek​ Snot. Be sure to utilise this by fouling with your regular Snots and Arguing the Call instead of bribing, saving the more reliable Bribes for keeping your big guns on (aka the wagons). Even better, your coach normally gets sent off on a roll of a 1 when Arguing the call preventing you from arguing further, but when you’ve bought out the ref, there’s no chance of that now!

I would look to get the Riotous Rookies inducement (100k) into this team as quickly as possible to help you manage your secret weapons and to maintain the numbers advantage for as long as you can.

All in all, this is probably the roster that many coaches will opt for, however, it is particularly difficult due to the secret weapon/bribe management (and the fact that at the end of the day, you’re Snotlings). It’s best to stagger your weapons as best you can, for example, Wagons on the Offence and Flingas on the Defence (Bomb those cages!). However, if you’re new to the team or in particular the game as a whole, whilst this roster is fun it is difficult to use effectively, so I’d recommend starting with one of the following two instead:

Roll Out!, 3 ReRolls | TV1000 Snotling Starting Rosters:

A personal favorite of mine. You essentially drop the 2 Fungus Flingas for 2 regular lineman, halving the number of secret weapons you have to manage. This means that with 3 bribes and a Biased Referee, there’s a good chance your Wagon’s can be on for the majority of the game, giving you four ST5 players consistently, making you nearly as strong as an Ogre team! Abuse this strength advantage as much as you can, dealing damage and prolonging the drive to get the most value out of them!

On top of 4 big guys throughout, you save 60k on your team value as even though you’ve got 2 extra snotlings to replace the Flingas, Linemen don’t add to your CTV! With this extra 60k, you can either buy a Bloodweiser Keg, as there’s a good chance your players will be KO’d, or I’d recommend spending some personal treasury to get the Riotous Rookies. It’s a 100k inducement that gives you 3-7 extra journeymen that can take you over the 16man roster limit. By doing so, you ensure the likelihood of being able to field 11 players (+D3 with swarming, which the journeymen also have!), meaning for those inevitable moments where you have only 1-2 turns left of a half, you can take off the Wagons, preserving your bribes for the next half. Even though this is the more expensive build compared to variant 3, you’ll have 180k starting treasury, I’m sure you can find an odd bit of cash to buy those extra Rookies!

Utterly Mortar-fying!, 4 ReRolls | TV1000 Snotling Starting Rosters:

I may have lied when I said the last build was my favourite. Cause THIS. This is my favourite. Thanks to the Fungus Flingas primary access to Passing Skills, they can do ‘reliably’ what I’ve been trying to do with Goblins for years. Mortars. That’s right! After a measly 6spp, you can give them Hail Mary Pass, allowing you to throw a bomb (with a 3 square scatter mind) anywhere on the pitch on a 2+. Anywhere. Put them on your Touchline and watch them go! Your opponent’s cage will s*** itself when it sees that what they thought was rain is actually made of metal and ticking. Granted you can only throw 1 bomb per turn, but having 2 Flingas on the roster gives you a safety net if one gets hurt. Levelling them can be a bit tricky, but unlike Goblin Bombardiers, these guys have Right Stuff! So early in your league, give them the ball, throw them with a Troll and try and score with them! After 2 successful attempts, BOOM. Instant Mortar​ (Geddit?)​ .

Once you have the Mortar’s you’re gonna wanna keep them throwing. So with the extra money we saved on the pump wagons, I’ve bought an extra reroll for those times you roll a 1 on that Hail Mary Pass. You’ve also got enough left over for Riotous Rookies and a Bloodweiser Keg too, which will be useful as you’ll have more players off the pitch, either from the lack of 4 big guys or, more likely, stray bombs (it just gets better and better doesn’t it!?) This build is the only one I’d consider an Apothecary for, but ONLY once I had a mortar that I wanted to save, likely from his own clumsiness.

Snotling Starting Rosters, Part 1 Summary:

Overall, these Snotling builds give you everything you want, with plenty of cash to spare. I would recommend picking a secret weapon and focusing around it, as trying to play with both effectively will take both good team management and a bit of luck to boot. The key is bribing weapons and maintaining the number advantage to either keep up 4 ST5 players or to keep the mortars raining.

As with any inducement suggestion here, you can swap them out as you desire. If a Wizard is your jam, go for it! Your inducement choice can change game to game so you can experiment to your heart’s content. Speaking of experimenting, I have some great suggestions in this next part for you to check out…

Part Two
Part Three