Jundheim Jugulars: Blood Bowl League Round 1 Game 5

 *BRRZZZTTT- News from 'the Warden of the North' as ' Coach Right Stuff ' plays his fifth Blood Bowl League game with Vampire team, the Mighty Jundheim Jugulars, against Halfling team "The Chode Pirates":*

Aaaaaand We're back with the weekly match report from the League in the Northern Wastes, this time the hungry and confident Vampires of the Jundheim Jugulars take on the much smaller, but much more stout scallywags of the Chode Pirates and their halflings! Coming off what is most likely the most dominant game of Bowl Bowl I have seen in years, the Vampires are clearly catching their stride after the rocky skill-less start to the season. Both the Throwers came out of last game gaining the Block skill and are keen to try it out by smacking some stunties to the ground. The Chode Pirates are also feeling quite good after giving the league leaders, the Disturbingly Dank Denizens(Underworld), their closest game of the season by far.

The Haflings hosted this game at their stadium hidden amongst the ports in the Border Princes, and the Coastal weather made the Vampires all the more uneasy with all the sunlight and life in the stadium as opposed to the cosy dark manor they call home. The coin is tossed and yet again the Vamps are losing said toss and kicking to their opposition. The vampire staff were smart enough to think ahead and pay some petty cash for a Budweiser Keg to help any knocked out thralls get back out there. The Halfling staff were just as busy as they set up their food stand of massive salty pretzels and rum in an attempt to distract the remaining vampire coaching staff. Hah! Vampires can't be lured by such mortal vices such as regular human food! right? guys? aaaand there they all go. (The Halfling Chef stole all 3 Vampire team re-rolls).

After setting up for the start of the game, Piotr is handed a rather juicy looking BLT instead of a ball to kick to the halflings. Not wanting to cause a fuss for his glorious vampire overlords, he kicks it anyway and we start the first drive with the Stacked Lunch Ball.

The rules for the Stacked Lunch Ball are as follows:
 - Five Second Rule: Both teams get +1 to pick up the ball
 - Lunchbox Jealousy: The kicking team gains the Strip Ball skill for the drive 
 - Mid Game Snack: When a player scores with the Stacked Lunch Ball, they need to pass a 2+ test in order to avoid eating the sandwich ball. If they do, they soon keel over with a tummy ache and that player misses the next drive.

The game begins with the smackdown
laid down by the massive wall of Treemen

The drives starts with a kickback and sets the tone for the vampire team's dice for the duration of the game. While the ref brings the ball back into play, the massive lineup that is the Treemen "Ship Wreck", "Driftwood" and the famous Deeproot Strongbranch waste no time in absolutely pummeling onto my sacrifical thralls on the line of scrimmage(one of which was knocked out). Behind this terrible and tremendous line of treesmen, the halflings create a hafling cage to protect the ball carrier and call it there. The Vampires, doing their best to hide the fear of the treemen, do what they do best and apply pressure, pressure, and more pressure. Baron Gregor von Kraus enjoys finally getting to use his Tackle skill and punches the crap out of the ball carrier named "One-Eye Yoghurt Slinger" and spills the ball....right into the hands of another halfling. Count Edgar and Piotr run up to mark the new ball carrier, and new treemen sacrifices are moved up. Viscount Friedrich is moved further up to block the way and Lady Striga stays back in fear of a potential teammate lobbing. The Duke gets in the face of some trees with appopriate thrall support to make it advantageous and knocks down Treeman "Driftwood". Deeproot uses his block and lack of Take Root(despite his name, ignore that) to pound onto the Baron and get him off the ball.

Baron Von Kraus employs his new Tackling skills to lay a return
smackdown onto the  ball carrier!

Unfortunately for the Halflings, the trees are too tied up by poor thrall sacrifices or are too busy standing up to help the new ball carrier get to a safer spot on the pitch. The Vamps take the chance and spill the ball again. Count Edgar manages to snap it up and bolt it up the pitch to the now open Viscount Freidrich, who takes a thrall escort and makes a run for it. The halflings tried but couldnt catch up with enough bodies to make it matter, and after dodging the weaponised throwing of a downed halfling as a desperate last attempt to knock him over, The Viscount Freidrich Freudenburg V scores the first TD of the game on turn 6 of the first half!

Viscount Freudenburg V makes a break for it down the left sideline!

Luckily he didn't feel too peckish and left the sandwhich ball alone. The referees however couldnt resist the snack and took it for themselves, replacing it with a league regulation ball for the rest of the game.

The celebration was short lived however, as despite the employment the "Picket Fence Formation" (which is entirely made up of lining up across the pitch a couple rows short of the end zone), the Halflings simply lobbed #6 "Yurp" to run in a one turn touchdown.

Eager to punish them for allowing them time to try and score, the Vamps line up an aggressive offense and prepare for "Air-Vamps" to take back the lead. Unfortunately for them, failing all 5 bloodlusts in one turn swiftly put a stop to that. To really drive home the point, Deeproot MNG'd #13 Vasyl, and Treeman "Ship-Wreck" Kills #11 Demetrius! For the folks counting along at home, this does keep the count for the season so far to 1 dead thrall per game(I'm suprised the Vampire nobles even name them at this point).

Half Time: 1-1.

Second half kicks off which the vamps head coach a bit nervous as he realises that no matter what, the halfling coach will have a chance to one turn touchdown again at the end of this half,. Even if the vamps score on their last turn. Respecting this, the vamps go for a hyper aggresive approach to this half, in hopes of scoring once early and then either shutting down the slower paced halfling offence or having enough time to score again after another one turn touchdown.

The rest of the Vampire coaching staff is left in food comas after feasting on all the goods the Halfling chef had to offer. (The chef takes all 3 rerolls again).

The Vamps attempt to push up hard along the left flank, and feed the runner, Lady Striga Drachenfeld down the right flank in an attempt to make them split the slow team in half and not having enough bodies to deal with both threats. Naturally, they fail 3 bloodlusts in the process and lose several thralls to casualties and knockouts. This results in a half baked protective bubble that any faster team could comfortably break open or stop from moving forward at all. 

The vulnerable offensive attempt of the Vampires after they've
snacked on nearly the entire rest of the team

Luckily for the vamps they are versing halflings and the massed 5 MA and several 2 MA pieces allow for such vulnerabilites to go unpunished. The pint-sized pirates do their best to put tackle zones in the way and try their best to get the trees to a relevant part of the pitch, but luckily its not quite enough. The Duke von Dragoslav(Vargheist) gets knocked out while keeping the Treemen busy and tied up, and Lady Striga occupies 3 halflings to herself which significantly aids the already dwindling numbers on the vampire side be on equal footing on the other side of the pitch. The bubble manages to move forward and away from the 'flings and up the pitch but takes a turn or two to do so due to a record number of failed hypnotic gazes, and losing more thralls on the way between the Treemen and the incredible number of failed blood lusts per turn. 

Lady Drachenfeld is nearly killed when the halflings marking her manage to get her down and gutter-stomp her into the casualty box. In order to be safe, the Apothecary dives into action just in case the natural regeneration abilities of the Vampire isn't enough. Thank god a good apothecary was hired because he managed to reduce the injury into a Badly Hurt result when the regeneration failed to kick in. The halflings on that side of the pitch are happy with their work, but arent fast enough to make it across the pitch in time as Viscount Freidrich Freudenburg V runs in the ball for the teams second touchdown for the game on Turn 7 of the second half.

The dwindling numbers of the Vampire team manages to break away and score the 
2nd touchdown for the game, despite the numbers disadvantage.

Knowing whats coming, the Picket fence is employed again but to no avail as the Halflings just soar overhead and score for a second touchdown.

Getting one last turn to try to score some SPP, Duke von Dragoslav goes to try for a fun block on a tree to see if his claws will get through. Double Skull. Re-roll from Brilliant Coaching kick off table result. Double Skull. Brilliant. 12 on the Armor Roll. 10 on the Injury Roll. Even better. Suffers a Niggling Injury. Regeneration? 1. *Deep Sigh from the Coach*.

Full Time 2-2 Draw, 1 casualty for, 8 against(4 self inflicted)

The Vampire teams casualty Box at full time, half of which is self-inflicted.

This last photo is of the last 4 players left on the pitch for the side of the Vampires... but what's that they're standing in front of? That's the brand spanking new scoreboard as provided by the team's biggest fan south of the northern wastes! A big thankyou from team management to that very special fan, heres to hoping it gets to display some more impressive scores in the near future!

The score at full time surrounded by what was left of the team at full time.

Aaaand thats the game for the week! Thanks to my opponent for a close game despite my record-breaking horrendous dice luck the whole way through. I look forward to meeting him further down the line with more developed teams on each side where im hoping the vamps can perform a little better with some more skills.

Speaking of skills, after receiving the MVP for the game due his imposing use of tackle, Baron Gregor van Kraus gains the Block skill. He's got his sights set on more exciting skills in the future along the lines of Mighty Blow or the dreaded Blodge, but Block is too good to pass up any longer.

As for you bloodbowl fans, you can catch us next week as we follow the progress of this promising up and coming Vampire team when they take on the Tomb King team of the Musty Mummies.
 - Right Stuff

At 3-2-0, the Jugulas remain at 2nd place in the League on TDs scored

Rediscovering Thunderbolt Apache Leader

Got some hobby supplies sent up from the Canberra Strategic Reserve, including a few games. Amongst them was this gem by GMT Games in 1992: Thunderbolt Apache Leader.

Comrade James introduced me to this in 1994 when it was only a few years old, and I got my own copy at the time. It was my first of many GMT games and that we played together, but I always loved how immersive and narrative TAH is. We played a particularly good set of campaigns together while at sea in 2007 but sadly the war diaries have been lost.

Contents are all still in great condition!

Interesting Fact: This game was the first one that veteran games artist Roger B McGowan (you'd recognise much of his work) did entirely on Computer - revolutionary at the time! See more of his work on Twitter @RBMStudio1

There wasn't a lot of additional material brought out for it at the time, but I did manage to track down this little article from a small wargaming magazine Called Panzerschrek,- this article is from Issue #7 in 2001

TAH has since spawned a whole array of games in the Leader series. The Game's designer Dan Versson left GMT Games, started his own games company (DVG) and released a revised version of TAH a decade or so ago, taking the game's mechanics in a different direction. 

More to follow as I rediscover this gem

More Civil War

Alan, John and I played another game of our Roman Civil Wars game this week with To The Strongest

As much as we enjoyed our previous games at 250 points, the table felt rather crowded with no room to manoeuvre. We scaled this game down to 150 points (which was hard!) and the additional space really enabled turning movements, flank actions and break aways. It also added space for more terrain, making light troops far more effective in rough terrain dotted around the battlefield and breaking up big formations of legionaries.

The additional space really allowed the game to more dynamic and break up around the terrain

For games at 250 points with additional players on both sides, we are guessing another 50% table space would be give the same experience.

I learned a few additional points of the rules, especially in terms of Missile fire priorities. Clever use of light forces can really draw fire away from the main line - must remember that for medieval era games when facing longbows! 

Back in the ancient era, the effective use of missile troops continues to elude us. We also keep forgetting that ancient cavalry are javelin throwing units best used for screening and exploitation, NOT lance carrying shock cavalry or Panzers!

Also, the impacts of trying to flank and having the 'victims' turn to face and applying a ZOC- this forces the formerly flanking unit to either turn to face in turn (and attack) or retire directly to its rear, shattering the impetus of the intended movement. Lesson is to leave a square between if you want greater surety of slipping past to savage the enemy rear. Or better yet, have another of your units to its front

All that said the game look great, but we felt equally frustrated at the turn of the cards so it must be well balanced!

Thanks for hosting us again Alan, and for another epic feast!