Vampire Thrall linemen have the unfortunate pleasure of having both the opposing team and their own teammates attacking them constantly throughout the game. If they’re not taking hits the Vampires would rather avoid, then their fanged friends will be feasting upon them instead, making them amongst the most disposable and unloved linemen in the game. That being said, they are vital to the Vampire team as without them the team can’t really function and the usually strong Vamps will be causing turnovers galore. Thankfully, they have a decent statline which means they can contribute beyond being a mobile snack and their cost of 40k means that you can very easily replace them, which you’ll need to do as many coaches will target the Thralls to weaken the team during a game. It also means you can have a decently sized bench for not too much money, so you’ll be able to field enough for both drives over the course of a game.

The expectation, however, is they’ll very rarely be getting SPP outside the odd MVP or maybe a Casualty, so unless you’re in a particularly long league you probably won’t be getting more than one skill on your Thralls, if they even live long enough. A well levelled Thrall is just SPP that could have gone on your more valuable Vampires. They are AG3+ so you could feed them a touchdown or two with some reliability.

Build List:

• • Random Skills
  • General
  • Wrestler

• Fouler

Vampire Thrall Linemen Base Stats:

Randomised Skills:

Thralls are a great candidate for Random skills. As mentioned above, they’re going to struggle for SPP so getting skills for cheap means you can at least get something on them. You can, for the most part, use everything in the General column for random Primaries. Block, Wrestle, Tackle, Kick, Dirty Player and Fend can be very useful, Block and Wrestle in particular. Pro, Sure Hands, Strip Ball, Frenzy and Dauntless can see some use but are less than ideal and should be first in line for marking a Mighty Blow player. Shadowing should put a player into the bin, buy a new one.

I’d say it’s worth going for a Primary over a Random Secondary, they’re going to be markers for the most part so Block is just better for the thrall than a 1/12 chance of Dodge or Guard.

General Thrall | Vampire Thrall Linemen Build

Primaries: Block, Kick, Fend, Tackle
Secondaries: Dodge, Guard
Characteristics: MA, ST, AG, AV

A general piece that marks up opposing players and takes your Bloodlust hits. Block is ideal for this as it means you can get some hits in during the game as well and will keep them on their feet so you can still move them around as needed, it’s just a great skill and useful on offence and defence.

After that, Kick is a good option for at least one of these players, so you can either kick deep vs slow teams and slow down their advance for a turn or two longer, or go for a shallow kick and try to steal, something your Vampires are very good at thanks to their high stats and Hypno-Gaze. I like taking Fend on the Thralls as well, although they are there as cheap fodder, they’ll stay alive longer if they take fewer hits in general, plus it’ll give you a chance to move them into a position for your Vamps to safely Bloodlust. Tackle works as well and contributes to their marking role.

If someone you manage to get a ton of SPP, Dodge is brilliant for them, if only for keeping them on their feet more often. Guard is pretty decent too but I’d take Dodge first and getting 26 SPP on a Thrall will be difficult.

Pretty much all of the Characteristics are useful, Strength and Agility obviously are the best, then Movement will let them keep up with your Runners. AV isn’t awful either, although has less value as it doesn’t matter for Bloodlust, but they might stick around a little longer to actually BE Bitten.

Fouling Thrall | Vampire Thrall Linemen Build

Primaries: Dirty Player, Block
Secondaries: Sneaky Git
Characteristics:

The usual cheap fouler! Dirty Player for that lovely +1 and if you can manage to grab it, then Sneaky Git is a big bonus to this player. If you can’t afford it, the Block is always a good shout for another skill. I wouldn’t get too crazy with this player, keep them cheap and cheerful!

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Without the Thralls, the Vampire team can’t operate at full effectiveness. While the main Vampires will be getting most of the SPP and as such most of the skills, having some levelled Thrall Linemen will still be very useful and will keep them going for your Vampires to nom on during the game.

You probably want to keep them fairly trim overall, they’re fodder at the end of the day and it’s your Vampires who will be making the difference.

That’s it for the Vampire Thrall Linemen build! Check out our guides for the Vampire Thrower, Vampire Blitzer, Vampire Runner and Vargheist!